Final Fantasy High School
by The Black Widow1
Summary: A story set around Cloud Strife and his older brother ... Sephiroth. There WILL be som OOC ness and it's rated M for future chapters. My first Final Fantasy fic, please be kind. NOT A CLOUD/SEPHIROTH PAIRING!
1. New Beginnings

**Disclaimer: I own nothing to do with Final Fantasy.**

**Hi everyone, this is my first attempt at a Final Fantasy fic, it was inspired by another high school fic while listening to One Winged Angel. It's also my first M rated work, so please be kind … I intend to write my first lemon in later chapters. For now though, enjoy.**

Chapter 1 – New Beginnings

Two boys, one fifteen and one sixteen, looked at their new high school. The older of the two seemed relaxed, the younger was nervous.

The older one looked down to his younger brother "There's not much to worry about, I'm just as new here as you are" he told the blond haired boy.

"Yeah, easy for you to say Seph, by end bell you'll be the most popular guy in school, just like always" he turned his ocean blue eyes to the floor "And I'll just be the class nerd".

Sephiroth placed a hand on his brother's shoulder "Cloud, I promise, it'll be different here, think about it, nobody knows us here. We could even swap places here, you'll be popular and I'll be the nerd" Cloud raised an eyebrow at his older, silver-haired and three inches taller brother "Ok, maybe not _that_ different, but it'll be different nonetheless" Cloud chuckled at that.

They walked in side by side, they looked like quite a contrast; Sephiroth was the taller of the two, but not by much, had silver hair and wore a black shirt and black jeans, with a pair of red and white trainers. His hair came to about his waist (at the back); the front was parted and framed his face.

Cloud however was blond haired, he was wearing a navy blue t-shirt with a pair of sky blue trousers, they were so long though, you couldn't tell that he was wearing shoes at all, but he liked it like that.

The only thing that they shared in common were their eyes, both had ocean blue eyes that seemed to shimmer, just like the ocean itself.

They came to a 'crossroads' Sephiroth looked left, right and straight ahead "Damned if I know where to go Cloud" he said Cloud just shook his head.

"Excuse me" he said to a girl who was wearing a pink skirt and blouse, she had brunette hair and was a little shorter than he was.

"Y-yes?" she answered; she had a kind, but nervous voice.

"M-my b-brother and I … we're new here … could you … um…" Cloud was nervous about talking to someone he didn't know, but Sephiroth got impatient.

"Could you show us where the Principle's office is?" he said.

"Yes, this way" she said, smiling kindly, Cloud let out a sigh of relief.

"Why were you taking so long" Sephiroth muttered in Cloud's ear.

"I-I-I don't know" he stammered.

Sephiroth looked at Cloud; then to the girl in pink, then back "You like her!"

"WHAT!" Cloud burst out, earning him a few strange looks "N-no I d-don't" Sephiroth wasn't convinced, but dropped the matter anyway, the girl stopped at a locker, got out some books and told the brothers that they needed to walk to the end of the hall they were on and that they needed to enter the reception, the Principle's office was through there, but they'd have to let the receptionist know why they were there.

They did as she said, and Sephiroth was annoyed to find that they walked past the damn thing while walking into the building.

Cloud shrugged, knocked and entered. A woman with black hair and green eyes, wearing a red sweatshirt and a plain black, floor-length skirt looked up from her computer.

She smiled at Cloud "Hi, what can I do for you" she asked, she sounded like she was at a celebration.

"Uh … my brother and I are new here, we were told to see the Principle before doing anything else" Cloud said, still sounding nervous, but not as much as earlier.

"Ok, well the old man's bound to say it more formally but, welcome to Besaid High I'm Elma the receptionist, and your names?" she said, still in that cheerful voice, Cloud could feel his nerves easing by the second.

"I'm Cloud" he said.

"Cloud, nice name, but I'll need you last name to get your timetable" she looked quizzically behind Cloud "You said you and your brother … where is he?" as she asked, Sephiroth walked in.

"Strife and this is Sephiroth, where've you been?" Cloud said.

"Sorry, there was a sudden flood of people barging in, I got swept away" Sephiroth answered.

There was the sound of a printer going off and Elma handed the brothers their timetables "There you go, now just go through that door, he's expecting you" she said pointing.

They went to the door, Cloud knocked out of courtesy, a voice grunted "come in" and they did so.

The Principle was standing at the window looking out; he stood at almost 6 foot, had iron grey hair and was wearing a dark red suit.

"I told you to come here before doing anything else" he said gruffly Cloud started to get nervous, seeing this Sephiroth decided to do the talking.

"We hadn't realised that we'd walked past the office … sir" he said, trying to sound humble, something he wasn't very good at.

"I see, you got lost, that is understandable, I've always said that we didn't put up enough signposts" he turned to face them he had a scar over his right eye which made it look as if that eye was useless, however his left eye was a bronze colour.

"Sir, forgive me for asking … but why have to asked to see us? In our previous schools we were simply given our timetables and sent to class by a rather rude receptionist" Sephiroth said the Principle chuckled.

"Yes, I understand your confusion, basically I disagree with the idea of practically ignoring a new student" he sat down and motioned Cloud and Sephiroth to do the same "My name is Auron, and I prefer to personally welcome each new student to Besaid High school, I've often been criticized for that, particularly when I force most of the students to be late on the first day of a new year and we have about a hundred and fifty students starting at once. This year I'm trying out the idea of assemblies, that way I can arrange to speak with them all without disrupting lessons" he explained.

"So … why are we d-different sir?" Cloud asked.

"Well this isn't your first year of high school …" he waited for a name.

"Cloud sir" he answered.

"Which must make you Sephiroth" Auron said, looking to the silver haired teen, who nodded.

"Well allow me to explain that I do not tolerate bullying of any kind, so if you're being troubled by anyone, please see one of your teachers, if that doesn't help, don't beat around the bush. Just come straight to me! I also have received reports Sephiroth, of you fighting in corridors. I would like to know why?" he said, Sephiroth scowled at the memory.

"Because _sir_ Cloud was being bullied, teachers did nothing, the Principle did nothing, in fact the …" he stopped himself before he swore "'young lads' were even beating him up while others just laughed, I think that fifteen against one is pretty unfair, so I lent Cloud a hand. He could've taken them one on one, but they knew that, so I gave them a taste of their own medicine" he finished with an icy tone.

"I see, well I respect that you were defending your brother, but hopefully things won't come to that here" he replied calmly.

"Thank you sir" Cloud said, looking down, slightly ashamed.

"Well I'll not keep you any longer, I will tell you that you'll have some classes together" Cloud and Sephiroth looked at their timetables with confusion "You see when it comes to combat class, we have older students pair off with younger students, and I find it more effective that way. Oh and Cloud" he looked up "from what I hear you're quite the brainiac, if what I hear is proven true I have a policy of 'stepping' intelligent students up to the next year, presuming that they can pass an aptitude test in all of their subjects" Cloud brightened up at that "Now go on, get to class" the bell rang "before you're late" the brothers said hurried goodbyes and left, Auron chuckled to himself, true he was scary to look at, but overall he was soft-hearted.


	2. First Day Part 1 Sibling Rivalry

**I own nothing to do with Final Fantasy, that honour belongs to Square Enix, and whoever created FF7 & 8. Hi everyone I'm back, I promise to update once a week, and I also promise a fight scene, enjoy!**

Chapter 2 – First Day Part 1 (Sibling Rivalry)

"So what've you got first?" Sephiroth asked.

Cloud looked at his timetable "Alchemy, you?"

"Something called Blitzball" he answered, confused to hell and back.

They got to the same crossroads that they struggled with before, they were about to pick a direction when.

"YOU! WHAT YOU DOING OUT OF CLASS!" a booming voice shouted down the hall, Cloud flinched, pounding footsteps came down the hall, the brothers turned to face a blue stomach, Cloud started looking up … and up … and up into a face that looked like thunder.

Even Sephiroth was startled, this guy had to be nearly a good seven foot tall "We … we're new here, can't find our classes" he said, slightly dazed by the fact that someone was actually _that much_ taller than him.

Cloud handed the blue giant his timetable "Could you tell me where I'm meant to be?" he asked and also took Sephiroth's from him.

"Kimahri know where" he pointed to a classroom and then looked at Sephiroth's "But Kimahri show you where you meant to be, follow Kimahri" and he went right while Cloud ran to his class.

When he got there he knocked and walked in.

"And just who the heck are you?" the teacher demanded.

"Cloud Strife, I'm new here, sorry I'm late" Cloud answered.

"Ah, I'll let ya off this time then, Auron gave you his little speech?" Cloud nodded.

"Well I'm Cid, and welcome to Alchemy, why don't ya just take a seat up front, next to Rikku?" he said, for some reason there was a murmur of laughter, and a girl wearing a revealing yellow top and kaki shorts palmed her face, Cloud decided to ignore the 'inside joke' and sat down.

Cid proceeded to write some instructions on the board and then went and sat down next to Cloud "Now I've been asked to offer you these aptitude tests to put you in the next year" he said.

"Hey how come I never got offered that?" Rikku demanded, quietly so as not to disturb the other students.

"You never asked Rikku, well here you go Cloud" he handed Cloud an Alchemy aptitude test "Now just keep working people, I'll be right back" and he left.

Cloud got started straight away and a few conversations started up "So, w-what was the joke?" Cloud asked.

"Oh _that,_ well you see, Cid's my dad, and he keeps trying to get me hooked up" she said and Cloud visibly paled "What, I'm not _that_ bad" she laughed.

"I-it's not that … it's just, that kind of talk get's me nervous" he answered, still getting on with the test.

"Well, don't worry about it, I've got my sights on someone else" she said with a devilish grin, Cloud left it at that and went on with his test.

Cid came back and the talking died down, he returned to Rikku "Here you go, I asked the Principle and he said to test you" Rikku bounced in her seat and started.

Both of them finished in about half an hour and then quickly caught up on the class work, before long they'd finished ahead of the class and Cloud was looking over his timetable.

"Hmm, looks like we're in the same classes" Rikku said looking over his shoulder "tat's lucky, I know this place like the back of my hand" Cloud was glad for that.

"So what're my teachers like?" he asked.

"Well for our next class I'll just say try your best to stay awake, no idea how I do, Maechen tends to ramble on a bit; then lose track of what he's said and start again, personally I'm worried that it won't be long before he's forcibly retired" she explained "I can't say I'm surprised, I mean the guy's, like, a hundred years old or something"

The bell rang shortly after that, Cid handed out homework to everyone but Cloud and Rikku, simply saying that with their results he doubted that he'd see them in that class' next lesson with him.

Rikku led Cloud to their History lesson, and Cloud learned what Rikku meant, he looked like he was once about five and a half foot, but age had clearly bent his back, he was now stooped at about four foot.

"Ah good morning Rikku how is your father?" he asked.

"He's fine" she answered.

Maechen then look puzzled "Tidus my boy, I thought you proceeded onto the next year" he said to Cloud who looked very perplexed.

Rikku had to fight not to laugh "This isn't Tidus Mr Maechen"

"I'm Cloud Strife" he said holding out his hand, which Maechen shook.

"Hmm I get the feeling that I should remember something" Maechen said thoughtfully.

"Would it have anything to do with Aptitude tests?" inquired Rikku.

"Ah yes, one for yourself and one for Mr Strife" he said "Please, take your seats" they did so, next to each other again. Maechen handed them their tests and they began immediately, and Maechen continued with the lesson as if nothing was different.

An hour later Rikku and Cloud had finished the test and taken all of the notes for the class, Cloud had never heard of the Machina war or Sin before 'learn something new everyday' he thought to himself.

"Well I'm heading off to meet up with my cousin, wanna come with?" Rikku asked.

"Yeah sure" Cloud answered and Rikku led him to the cafeteria.

"So how old is your cousin?" he asked.

"Two years older than me, which puts her in the year above us; there she is" she pointed to a table "Who's the guy with the cool hair?" Cloud looked.

"My brother" he said and they walked over.

"Yunie!" Rikku squealed and hugged a brunette wearing a white top and a white and blue floor-length skirt.

"Who's that Yuna?" Sephiroth asked.

"That's her cousin Rikku" a blond haired boy with blue eyes answered.

"I'm guessing you're Tidus" Cloud said, Tidus blinked.

"Yeah I am … how'd you know?" he asked.

"Maechen thought he was you" Rikku answered earning a laugh and a round of applause from everyone but Sephiroth.

"I'm going to skip that, everyone this s my little brother Cloud, who might be joining us soon" Sephiroth announced "Cloud this is Yuna" Rikku's cousin "Tidus, her boyfriend, so don't try anything" Cloud scowled at his brother and nodded at his lookalike "Gippal" another blond, wearing an eye patch on his right eye, along with purple and green baggy t-shirt and trousers "Baralai, Paine, Wakka, Lulu, Squall, Rinoa, Irvine, Selphie, Tifa and Aeris" he said pointing to a different person, Cloud remembered Aeris helping them when they were lost that morning.

"N-nice to meet all of you" he said shyly.

"Eh another shy one, things are lookin' up Aeris ya?" Wakka said, he had flaming red hair that curved upwards and towards the back of his head, Aeris blushed at what he said, as did Cloud, but Lulu slapped his arm for what he said "What?".

"Anyway" said Rikku, trying to save her friend from further embarrassment "I might be joining you guys too, I'm taking the aptitude tests" Yuna squealed happily and hugged Rikku and everyone else just went with congrats.

"So what teachers have you had so far?" Cloud asked.

"Well there's Mr Wallace who teaches all forms of sport, they separate them here unlike our old school, turns out Blitzball is an underwater sport and is a cross between Rugby and Water Polo … and I suck at it…" Sephiroth started.

"Aw come on man, you've just never played before, you'll get used to it" Tidus interrupted him.

"I couldn't even hold my breath for two minutes!" Sephiroth countered "Anyway my second lesson was magic with Miss Trepe, and trust me when I say, don't piss Lulu off, cause she _rocks_ at that subject."

Cloud took out his time table "Seems we've got combat next, both of us" he said.

"That'll mean all of us" Baralai stated, he had a calm voice, white hair and green robes, he looked like some kind of priest "our classes mix for that subject"

"And the best part is we can bring our own weapons if we want" added Gippal, Cloud and Sephiroth froze at that "what's up guys?"

"W-we didn't know" Sephiroth answered.

"No sweat, Auron would've told your parents and personally fetched them, I tell ya, that guy is _cool_ for his age" Tidus said and then the bell rang the group returned to their lockers and fetched their weapons.

Cloud followed Rikku to the changing rooms, where they parted and he met up with Sephiroth in the boy's locker room, he was polishing his blade, which took some effort, since it was at least two metres long.

"Whoa man, that sword is cool" Gippal said admiring it.

Sephiroth smirked "You should see Cloud's" he said and, looking at Cloud, nodded his head at a case on the bench opposite himself.

Squall had assembled his own sword, a gunblade, and watched as Cloud laid his case down, popped the catches and opened the case.

"WHAT THE FUCK!" Tidus shouted, causing the teacher to enter, it was Kimahri.

"Kimahri not allow swearing in Kimahri's lesson" he growled.

"Sorry sir, it's just the size of that sword caught me off guard" Tidus replied, pointing at the sword Cloud now held in his hands.

It was only about a metre long but at least two inches thick and five inches wide, everyone in the room was surprised that Cloud could even hold it up, he then got into his battle stance and with most of the sword's weight on his leg it seemed obvious now. But Sephiroth knew better, that was just a ploy to trick his opponents.

"Sir, would it be alright for me to partner with my brother?" Cloud and Sephiroth asked at the same time, they looked at each other and smirked.

"Kimahri intended that in first place" he said, them walked out, motioning everyone to follow him.

To be safe, Cloud and Sephiroth went last, so as not to hit anyone. Cloud walked with his Buster Sword over his shoulder and Sephiroth walked with Masamune by his side, blade sticking three metres out behind him, looking like a deranged tail.

The girls walked out of their changing room in their battle attire, carrying or wearing (in Tifa's case) their weapons, when they saw the new guys' swords, they gasped in awe.

"Everyone pair up" Kimahri ordered, they did "Now stand aside, Kimahri wishes to see how skilled new students are" Cloud and Sephiroth looked at each other and smirked.

Once everyone was out of the way, Sephiroth attacked Cloud, the girls screamed, but Cloud had already seen that coming and blocked it.

But Sephiroth was slightly faster and slugged his brother, sending him soaring across the room, Cloud landed on his feet and got into his stance, as did Sephiroth (holding Masamune with both hands above his head).

They charged at each other, clashing their swords and sending a shockwave through the room, 'good thing everyone was already against the wall' they both thought.

They leapt into the air and started trading blows, as one would attack, the other would block or parry, finally Sephiroth knocked Cloud towards the ground. Cloud flipped in mid-air to see his brother had vanished; he looked left, then right and was slammed into as Sephiroth came from nowhere.

"Nice indent in the wall you've made" Sephiroth taunted, Cloud unstuck himself and went on the offensive, he managed to get in a few blows to his brother, but he was beginning to tire out.

Sephiroth seemed faster to Kimahri, whereas Cloud's blows would cause more damage. Eventually Cloud was on one knee, gasping for breath, his brother slugged him again, into a wall.

Cloud was dazed, maybe he'd hit his head, he felt a sudden pain and the girls on either side of him screamed. He looked down and saw Masamune sticking into the wall behind him, through his shoulder; he grimaced and traced the blade to Sephiroth.

"You're getting better I'll admit that, but you still have much to learn" he said.

Cloud grabbed the blade, pulled it out, thrust it back into the wall and attempted to spin attack Sephiroth.

"That … HURT!" he shouted, Sephiroth charged, Cloud swung, Seph somersaulted and launched himself off a wall.

Cloud followed him and, with a face like thunder, tried to use an Omi Slash, his sword split into eight ghostly ones and he moved quick as lightning from on to the next, slashing Sephiroth with each.

But before he made the finishing blow, a fireball erupted between them and they both hit the deck.

"Thank you Lulu, I was warned that you two might be a little over competitive with each other" Auron said.

"Kimahri think you very skilled, but this school, not war" he scolded as Yuna ran forward along with Aeris armed with cure spells.

After their wounds were healed Cloud and Sephiroth were told to split up and assist the sword students since there was very little Kimahri could teach then.

During the lesson Sephiroth got to know Rikku better and Cloud got talking to Tidus and Yuna, while teaching Tidus how to deflect bullets with a sword.

After the lesson, the brothers left together, their injuries forgotten, and they were shown where they could keep their swords until the end of the day.

And then it was lunch time.

"So come on guys, tell us, how'd you learn to fight like that?" Paine asked.

"Well our Dad used to be in SOLIDER, he taught me and I taught Cloud" said Sephiroth.

"Why didn't he teach you too cloud" Aeris asked.

"Because he believes it's a father's duty to teach his eldest child, and then the elder's duty to teach the younger siblings, pass it on sort of thing" Cloud answered.

"Oh" Aeris said and they continued to the cafeteria for lunch.

**Well that's all for now, please review, I'd like to know what you think, where I've gone wrong, how I could improve, and I'm also taking requests, ask me for something and I'll see about adding it in (don't worry I'll let you know if I already planned what you've asked for).**

**Ps I have had one person get confused, **_**this is NOT a CloudxSephiroth fic, I only named them as the first and second characters because the story revolves around their lives,**_** but don't let that put you off.**


	3. First Day Part 2 The Git Squad

**Hi everyone, I'm back with another chapter … I own nothing to do with final fantasy and may you all enjoy the second half of Cloud's first day ^_^**

Chapter 3 – First Day Part 2 (The Git Squad)

The large group entered the cafeteria and Tidus asked about pulling some tables together (since they only allowed for about four people); he was told yes, but no more than four tables.

They pulled the tables together and sat down (it was boy, boy, girl, girl) Cloud and Sephiroth sat next to each other, with Tifa next to Seph and Aeris next to Cloud.

"Right, me, Cloud, Aeris, Gippal, Tidus, Yuna, Squall and Rinoa can stay here and look after the table while everyone else goes and gets their food" Rikku said, everyone agreed and Sephiroth, Tifa, Selphie, Irvine, Wakka, Lulu, Baralai and Paine stood up to get something to eat.

While they were gone a tall guy crept up behind Yuna and grabbed her, fondling her breasts at the same time "Hi sexy" he said, his voice icier than an igloo.

Yuna spun quickly, attempting to slap the offender, but he was too fast, he grabbed her wrist with fingers twice as long as Cloud's, the guy was just over six foot,he had blue hair which looked like it was gelled into odd angles, but most of it could have down to his waist if it wasn't, he was wearing a royal blue shirt (with the top four buttons undone) which showed off a hairless chest, with a weird looking tattoo.

At the sight of him everyone (except Cloud of course) jumped to their feet.

"Piss off Seymour" Squall said with venom

Seymour then switched from an icy voice to a silky voice "Why would I want to do that?" he said, trying to sound innocent, but after seeing him grab Yuna like he wanted to shred the guy's face apart, for one thing she was spoken for, for another he never asked or gave any warning and finally, that kind of thing shouldn't be done in public as far as he was concerned (at least not so openly).

Tidus then spoke up "Because if you don't I guarantee that Auron _will_ get involved" Seymour glared at Tidus and clenched his fists, but after seeing both everyone at the table and in the cafeteria line do the same, he thought better of it.

"Very well, but before I go" he pointed at Cloud "Who's the new blood?" he asked.

This time Rikku looked like she was about to charge over the table and physically tell Seymour to 'piss off' but Cloud motioned that she didn't need to, he stood up and looked Seymour in the eye, the guy might be taller than him, but he wasn't scared.

"Name's Cloud" he said glaring at him "and who the fuck are you supposed to be" Cloud was normally a nervous person, but when a fight seemed imminent, he always gained confidence.

Seymour narrowed his eyes "You've got a mouth on you slime".

With that Cloud was about to break this asshole's nose but was interrupted.

"What's going on here" asked a sweet female voice, and every one turned to a red haired woman who was wearing an orange work dress.

Seymour bowed to her, she was obviously a teacher "Nothing Miss Trepe, but this new kid was about to hit me without provocation" he told he pointing.

"Well you just go and join your friends Mr Guado, and I shall deal with it" Miss Trepe said, Seymour smirked behind her back and went to join a table with nine other people "Now might one of you tell me the truth?" she asked.

"He … violated me Ma'am" Yuna answered, looking at the floor.

"In what way? And for heaven's sake Yuna, we're not in class so please call me Quistis" she said, but not unkindly.

Yuna seemed unwilling to answer, so Tidus told her of the events, without leaving out the foul language.

"I see, of course I can only advise that you steer clear of him, his father will just say 'my word against yours' … I'm sorry Yuna" Quistis said, Yuna nodded and the teacher walked away.

Sitting down Cloud asked "what's his problem?" pointing over his shoulder at Seymour.

"That's Seymour Guado; he's practically in charge of the Git Squad" Paine explained returning from the food line, everyone involved in the 'almost-fight' then got up and went to get some food.

While standing between Yuna and Tidus Cloud asked "Firstly, what's the Git Squad? And secondly, what did _he_ do to you Yuna? It's obvious that he did something in the past".

"Basically the Git Squad is the one and only band of bullies here, Auron wants them out, but they've all got parents connected in high places so unless someone can prove what they do with written confessions or something on tape, he can't do nothing" Tidus explained, answering Cloud's first question, he looked to Yuna as if asking her permission to carry on and she nodded "And as to what he did to Yuna, he tried to rape her" Cloud stopped dead and Tidus crashed into him.

"Seriously" he asked, Yuna nodded "The next time he comes near you I'll kill him" he said, back at their table Sephiroth was obviously being told too, because the guys were now fighting to get him to sit back down. "You say tried, what happened?" Cloud asked.

"W-well, he'd pinned me, taken my clothes off and tied me to the bed, he gagged me too. But as soon as he was about to … you know" Cloud didn't know, but he had a vague idea "but thankfully my Dad and Tidus walked in to talk to me and caught him … Tidus clubbed him with my bed lamp and my Dad threw him out and got a restraining order against him. You can imagine that I dumped him shortly after that"

"YOU WERE DATING THAT GREASEBALL!!" Cloud yelled.

Yuna nodded, ashamed "Yes".

"That isn't the problem; the real problem is that the restraining order doesn't stop him from bothering Yunie at school" Rikku explained.

"And let me guess … we can't do anything otherwise his _mummy_ will personally see to it that _we_ get kicked out" Cloud asked, miffed off "So who else is in this Squad?"

"Well there's Seifer and his personal cronies Raijin and Fujin, Leblanc, her boyfriend Nooj and their two lackeys Logos and Ormi, Seymour you've already had the pleasure" Tidus said sarcastically "Rufus Shinra is the richest of them, and finally" he looked around and lowered his voice "my twin brother Shuyin is only there as a spy, they never hang out outside of school, so he can give the heads up on who they're targeting to beat up next, so we then turn up to deal with them … sorry to tell you this now but by just sitting with us, they've now pegged you as members of our group" he explained apologetically.

"I'm honoured" Cloud laughed "So is your brother safe?" he asked.

"Not really … see he's taking a risk by going out with Lenne, terrific singer, she hangs … out … with, OH CRAP!" Gippal answered, looking at their table.

"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING IN MY SEAT!!!?" demanded a smallish girl in green and yellow with short raven hair of Sephiroth.

"Yuffie, calm down, we'll fix this. Lenne, Yuffie meet Sephiroth, one of the two newest members of our anti-bully Crusaders" Baralai answered calmly.

"Who's the other one?" Lenne answered softly, she had auburn hair that fell to her waist and was wearing a purple top and a dark blue denim skirt.

"My brother" Sephiroth answered thumbing to Cloud who was picking a desert.

"Oh" Lenne answered "was he sitting here?" she asked (she was sitting next to Sephiroth).

"Yes he was" answered Aeris distractedly while taking her seat again.

"Oh someone has a crush" Lenne whispered to Aeris who tried to deny it.

The others finished in the queue, paid for their food and returned to the table, Cloud offered to be the gentleman he was and stayed standing, Yuffie sat on the edge of the table and ate her packed lunch there and Cloud followed suit and sat on the edge of the table to eat.

Mid-way through the conversation there was a commotion at the Git Squad's table, a fat guy was yelling at Shuyin and he was protesting, then Seymour held him in place and the fat guy started punching him, Tidus was about to get up and help him when Kimahri stepped in.

"YOU STOP NOW!!!" he bellowed, picking the fat man up bodily and glaring at Seymour, who released Shuyin and told him to get lost.

Shuyin stumbled over to the Crusader's table and they pulled up another spare table (since they practically filled it) and now everybody was sat down asking what happened.

"That Ormi bastard saw me on a date last night with Lenne" he explained while Lenne was trying to clean a cut over his eyebrow "So he just brought it up, next thing I know I'm being pinned from behind and the lard tub is beating the crap out of me"

"I guess that means we've lost our spy" Yuffie said "That'll make our job easier" she finished sarcastically.

Shuyin waved to Sephiroth and Cloud "Sorry that we've not had the chance to meet, I'm Shuyin Watanuki, Tidus' brother" the Strife brothers nodded.

"I'm Sephiroth Strife, but you can call me Seph, and this is my little brother Cloud" Sephiroth answered him.

Lunch was finished with the crusaders getting to know each other better and then the group had to split up again, Cloud and Rikku to do more aptitude tests, Lenne and Yuffie to their lessons (they were in the year below Cloud and Rikku) and everyone else to their class.

During that afternoon Cloud and Rikku completed tests for English (taught by Mr Biggs), Maths (with Mr Wedge), Magic (with Miss Trepe) and Sports (with Mr Wallace).

Now the lessons were over, everyday the same subjects were taught, but different ones got the two double periods on different days.

With their tests completed Rikku was walking Cloud to their lockers to drop off their books and then report to Principle Auron's office to get their results.

Rikku had just finished putting her books away and closed her locker when she noticed people being shoved into walls "Cloud, don't look now but it looks like the Git Squad's gunning for ya"

"I know, that Ormi has heavy feet" he replied, calmly closing his locker and tilting his head to the side as Ormi's fist sailed past his head and through the locker door "Well, that's _one_ way to open a locker" he looked at Ormi "but how do you suggest to close it again?"

"Hmm Seymour was right, you do have a mouth on you" a tall, slim guy wearing a blue, silky robe with weird symbols on it drawled.

"But he's cute though, too bad he's both a geek and hangs out with those losers too" some blond bimbo said, you could tell she was a slut, she was wearing what looked to be nothing but a pink coat which practically had her chest out.

"What do you want Leblanc" Rikku demanded.

"Just to show the new guy who's in charge around here" Ormi shouted, he talked as dumb as he looked.

Cloud noticed something behind who he guessed was Logos and smirked "Go ahead then, your best shot please" Ormi was confused for a second, but once he got the idea he pulled his fist back.

But before he could do anything about it someone tapped his shoulder with a sword "I wouldn't do that if I were you" Sephiroth said calmly, Logos looked along the blade and his eyes widened in shock.

"Ormi, I think it would be best if you just backed down" he said with fear.

"WHAT! The guy's using a sword, I've just gotta spin and …" he spun throwing his fist and missed Sephiroth altogether, he was simply out of reach, in his right hand was Masamune and in his left, was the case containing Cloud's Buster Sword.

"Hey Cloud, catch" Sephiroth said, tossing the case to his brother, who caught it, whipped out the sword and got into his stance "Now I would suggest that you don't try and hit my brother again" Sephiroth said, now pointing the tip of his blade at Ormi's throat "am I clear?" Ormi nodded and ran … well waddled away, followed closely by Logos and Leblanc.

"This isn't over loves" Leblanc called back.

Cloud put his sword back in its case "Why am I not surprised, I've gotta go to the Principle's office, coming Seph?" he nodded and they walked off.

**Well that's all from me until next week, when we'll find out if Cloud and Rikku get to advance … wait a sec, YOU'LL get to find out … I already know XP, anyway, please review and I'll see you all next week.**


	4. Good News & Bad News

**I own nothing.**

**Hi all, here's chapter four, enjoy.**

Chapter 4 – Good News & Bad News

Cloud, Sephiroth and Rikku walked to the Principle's office, when they walked in Elma looked a little down.

"Hey El. S'up?" Rikku asked cheerfully.

She sighed "You're about to find out" she said pointing at Auron's door.

Feeling apprehensive, they moved on, into Auron's office, he had a smirk on his face.

"I have good news and bad news. Which do you want first?" he said.

"Uhhh, the good?" Cloud said nervously.

"You both passed your test with flying colours, the bad news is you've both now got new timetables to get lost with" he informed them with a chuckle.

Sephiroth clapped Cloud on the back "Congrats smart guy, Dad's gonna flip, but at least Mum'll be pleased"

"Yeah" Cloud answered, grinning from ear to ear.

"Rikku will you be staying until your father is finished as usual?" Auron asked.

She shrugged "Yeah I guess"

Cloud thought for a moment "Seph, how would Mum and Dad react to me bringing home a friend unannounced?"

He laughed "Drop dead from shock most likely, but I get away with it all the time so don't worry about trouble" he said.

"Great, Rikku, wanna come over to my house? It's gotta be better than staying here for god only knows how long." Cloud called, since Rikku was halfway to the door already.

"Yeah sure, wait here I'll just ask my Dad." She dropped her bag and ran off. Auron looked at the bag disapprovingly but Sephiroth just picked it up and shouldered it.

She was back soon enough "Dad says it's fine" she told them and the left.

Fifteen minutes later the trio arrived at Cloud's and Sephiroth's home.

It was a nice little place, two floors, low brick wall surrounding a perfect lawn and a huge back garden, big enough for a small pool and a large party Rikku thought to herself.

"Well comin' in?" Cloud asked; Sephiroth had already gone inside.

Rikku nodded but got distracted by someone yelling to Cloud.

"Hi Dad" he called back to a well built man with messy blond hair and Iron grey eyes on a huge yellow bird.

"YOU'VE GOT A CHOCOBO?!?!" Rikku squealed, running to stroke the animal.

"And who's this?" Cloud's Dad asked, eyeing Rikku quizzically.

"Her name's Rikku, she's a friend I made at school today" Cloud answered, causing his father to nearly die from shock.

"You … made a friend … at school … who are you and where is my son?" he said.

By now Sephiroth had come outside and was laughing his head off "Don't worry Dad it's still Cloud, Rikku I'd like you to meet our Dad, Tiler, it's pronounced Tyler but with an I instead" he explained.

Rikku stuck out her hand "Pleased to meet you sir, I'm Rikku" she said with a smile that reached her eyes.

Tiler smiled too "Hi Rikku, what's with the eyes" he asked, noticing the swirls in her eyes.

"Oh … I'm an Al Bhed" she said.

"Hmmm, interesting, well let's go in I can smell Jen's cooking already" he stated and, after giving Rikku a slight push in the small of her back, started guiding the bird into his paddock.

"What's his name?" Rikku asked.

"Well Dad decided to call him Speedy" Cloud answered.

"Why?"

"Because he used to be a racing chocobo, but he was released to us because of mistreatment" Sephiroth explained.

"Oh, don't say anymore, I hate hearing about cruelty to animals, I break down in tears before anyone can blink" she said, blinking back tears already.

"I'm just as bad" a soft female voice answered "Hi I'm Jen, Cloud's mother" she said, holding out a few tissues for Rikku's eyes.

"Thanks" Rikku mumbled, taking the tissues and wiping her eyes.

"Are you staying for dinner?" Jen asked Rikku. She had cerulean eyes like both her sons and grey shoulder length hair.

"Yeah if that's alright" she answered and started sniffing "Mmm, what's cooking?"

Cloud walked downstairs with a cleaner face "That would be" he sniffed the air "What is that?" he asked, not recognising the smell.

"I'm trying something new, wild Lupine stew" Jen explained.

"Uhhh, not meaning to be rude but…" Rikku started.

"You don't like Vegetables?" Rikku nodded "Neither do I, don't worry, I'll just do extra 'non-veggie' stew" Jen told her kindly.

"Stew isn't stew without vegetables" Tiler complained, earning him a kiss from Jen.

"Quit whining and set the table" she said smiling evilly.

"Remind me why I married you?" he said, doing as he was told.

"Because you were mad" Cloud answered, but after a look from his mother added "Ly in love" which caused Rikku to grin.

"Remind me again why we have to wash our hands _and_ faces before every meal?" Sephiroth asked, coming downstairs, his fringe dripping slightly.

"Because your face picks up traces of dust during the day, and _you_ tend to have a scuffle with your friends at school" Jen answered.

"Yeah well, whenever I wash my face my hair get's wet" Sephiroth gestured to his dripping fringe.

"Well she keeps telling you to get it cut, but if you like I can give you a crew cut" Tiler offered.

"DO IT AND DIE!!!!" Sephiroth exploded earning him a round of pointing and laughing.

Half an hour later everyone was eating at the dinner table.

"Hey Mum, Cloud's got some news about school" Sephiroth stated.

Cloud scratched the back of his neck nervously "I uh kinda got kicked out of class today"

"WHAT!" his mother exploded.

"And moved up to Seph's class" he finished.

Jen blinked a few times, processing what her youngest son had said, then squealed once she realised what he was saying.

Sephiroth explained to his father what had happened, mainly because Cloud was being crushed by a bear hug.

"Well I think this calls for a celebration" Tiler called, but that idea was interrupted by a knock on the front door, Jen answered and Cid stood there.

"Hi, is Rikku still here" he asked, Rikku came to the door.

"Hi Pop" she said.

"Hey sweetheart, we need to get goin' if you're gonna have that sleepover" he told her.

"Oh poopie I forgot" she looked at Cloud and Sephiroth at the table "Listen I know you said no boys, but can I invite Cloud and Seph?" she whispered to him.

He looked at the two young men, then to his daughter and smiled "Ok, just this once and only if their folks say so" he answered.

She asked the boys, who asked their parents. They were sceptical because it was a school night, but once they found out that Cid was the Alchemy teacher at school and would ensure that they got to school early, they consented and decided to have their celebration tomorrow instead.

Now they were in the supermarket, grabbing snacks and fizzy drinks to last them the night, Cid had even gone so far as to allow Rikku and her girlfriends to allow the rest of the boys over to celebrate her and Cloud advancing classes. But under the condition that boys slept in a different room from girls.

Not only did that mean extra supplies, but the boys were stuck with Brother, Rikku's older brother, who Rikku explained was slightly bi-sexual, but the only girl he'd ever tried it on with was Yuna, other than her he was totally homosexual.

"How likely is he to try it on with us?" Cloud asked.

"That depends" she answered.

"On what exactly" Sephiroth asked.

"On how cute he thinks you are on sight" she told him casually.

"Would he respect the fact that I'm not interested?" Cloud asked.

"Only if you tell him at sword or gun point" she answered.

"Suddenly I'm getting worried about tonight" Sephiroth mumbled.

Later they're at Rikku's house with the rest of the Crusaders watching a comedy movie, everyone was in stitches laughing as one of the male cadets got caught spying on the females in the shower, drinking a beer. Then the officer that caught him got seen and all the women started pointing and screaming.

After Police Academy was finished Squall whipped out The Strangers and put it on, before anyone could protest, before the movie was half way done all the girls were cuddling into their boyfriends in fear, Yuffie had run from the room and Aeris and Tifa being single settled for Cloud and Seph.

Sephiroth didn't hesitate to place an arm around Tifa, but Cloud was unsure about what to do, he looked around the room, the guys all had an arm around a girl that was cowering into a guy, while that guy was still watching with keen interest.

The problem for Cloud was that he too was getting freaked out, but he eventually put an arm around Aeris and held on for dear life, it felt strangely comfortable holding her like that.

By the end of the film everyone except Squall and Seph were starting to feel sick, knowing what was coming.

The two victims were tied to chairs, in the living room with the curtains wide open on a bright and beautiful morning. The man was slightly drowsy, not surprising since he'd taken a fist to the face earlier and now had a concussion, but the woman was struggling against her bonds and begging for their lives.

"Why are you doing this to us" she asked the three masked people before them, on the verge of tears.

"Because you were home" the blond female answered.

Five minutes later Cloud was in the bathroom, throwing up, with Aeris rubbing his back soothingly. She'd had the sense to run out of the room before things got ugly, but from the noise of the TV she gathered what had happened.

Now everyone was back in the common room, shaking slightly.

"I'm never going to sleep after that" Cloud said, looking slightly green, Sephiroth was worried that he might be sick again.

"Squall, what were you thinking?" asked Rinoa in a falsely sweet voice.

He shrugged "I thought you'd enjoy it" that earned him a slap.

"The next person that tried to make me watch that again is going to be hospitalised" said Cloud, sounding a little traumatised.

There was a general murmur of agreement.

"On a brighter note, who's up for either Truth of Dare or Spin the Bottle?" Rikku asked.

"Well I'm out on both games, it's nearly my bedtime and I've got a boyfriend, if he were here then I'd play, but … never mind" Yuffie said, heading for the door.

"Where was Zell today?" Tifa asked.

"Slight stomach flu, his Mum said" Yuffie answered "which is why he didn't come tonight either" she left to get some sleep.

They decided on Spin the Bottle first, since Cloud had never been to a sleepover before and therefore hadn't played these games, Rikku explained.

"Right basically I spin" she did so and the bottle stopped on Lulu "and the person that it stops on, I've got to kiss" she stood up, walked across the circle to Lulu and kissed her on the lips, much to the guys whooping and Lulu's struggling "and now it's Lulu's turn to spin, understand?" Cloud nodded.

"What if you refuse?" he asked.

"You lose an item of clothing" Tidus answered, causing Cloud to pale, more so when Lulu's spin stopped on him, she leaned across Aeris and pecked Cloud on the lips, making him blush.

Cloud spun the bottle and it landed on Yuna, he hesitated instantly.

"It's alright Cloud, it's just a game" Seph encouraged. Cloud looked to Tidus, who shrugged, and crossed the circle and pecked Yuna on the cheek.

"No good Cloud, it's gotta be on the lips" Gippal called and took a mouthful of his coke.

Gulping Cloud pecked Yuna again, this time on the lips "There that wasn't so hard was it?" Yuna asked and Cloud shook his head.

Yuna spun and had to kiss Rikku, but because they were cousins decided to forfeit and removed her boots, much to the complaints of the guys that were looking forward to another girl/girl kiss.

Seph decided to spin this time, since Rikku had already spun once and it landed on Tifa, she grinned and he attacked her mouth with his own, Cloud looked away once they moved to tongues, Aeris had looked away too and everyone else was yelling encouragement.

After about five minutes they broke apart and Tifa spun as if nothing had happened, hers landed between Baralai and Paine, which meant that they had to do a three way kiss, she crawled over to them and Cloud couldn't understand what happened, but somehow the three of them had managed to kiss each other, at the same time, on the lips.

Rikku tossed a coin, which Paine had called and lost, and Baralai spun, it landed on Shuyin.

"Kiss him or strip 'lai" Seph said calmly.

Since he was only wearing his robe and underwear, he couldn't afford to forfeit, so he got up, crossed the room and quickly pecked Shuyin and ran back to Paine to kiss her and get rid of the taste, while Shuyin did the same with Lenne.

"Was that the best you could do?" Rikku demanded, slightly hyper … well, more than usual.

"Trust me that's the best you'll get from me on another guy" Shuyin exclaimed as he spun and landed on Selphie.

The game continued until everyone got bored, during which time Cloud had become topless from refusing to kiss his brother and had, at one point, spun and landed on Aeris, he originally planned to just peck her like everyone else, but instead ended up having a passionate kiss with her.

Now they had moved onto Truth or Dare, everyone got to put their clothes back on, which upset Seph slightly because Tifa had refused to kiss Gippal and was sat next to him with just her bra and shorts on.

Thankfully Cloud knew the rules here, but not the forfeit rule, he was used to 'if you refuse a dare, you've got to tell a truth and vice versa' rule, not the forfeit and strip rule these guys were wild.

But they never got the chance to start because Cid walked in and ordered everyone to bed because it had gone ten pm.

The girls went and joined Yuffie in Rikku's room and the guys went to Brother's. They arranged things so that heavy sleepers slept furthest from Brother's bed and light sleepers would be woken up by him trying to get past them.

Thankfully he was already asleep and Cloud was placed well away from his bed, but he couldn't sleep anyway, whenever he closed his eyes that movie replayed itself and when he had his eyes open her screams filled his ears, eerily mixed with Wakka's snores.

In the end he gave up, got out of bed, silently made his way downstairs, got himself a drink and sat down to watch some TV, hoping that eventually he would just drift off.

About five minutes later Cloud heard someone creeping down the stairs, with The Strangers still firmly in his mind, he freaked, hid behind the sofa and cursed himself for leaving his sword at home.

All his fears were for nought though, it was just Aeris. Cloud let out a loud sigh of relief, making her jump.

"Sorry" he said, standing up.

She smiled when she saw him "Couldn't sleep either?" he shook his head.

"Decided to watch TV and see if I just drift off" he said sitting back down Aeris joined him and picked up the TV magazine to see what was on.

"Looks like a choice between ordinary shows or two movies. Blade or Trading Places" she said after checking the time.

"Well I've seen both of those movies; Blade's a human/vampire hybrid, all of their strengths, none of their weaknesses. He's a vampire hunter that they call the Daywalker. Trading Places on the other hand is a romantic comedy, which I'd rather watch at this time of night" Cloud explained and, agreeing, Aeris switched to channel three and sat back.

Within an hour she had fallen asleep on his shoulder. Smiling, Cloud placed an arm around her and fell asleep too.

**That's all for this week, please review, and tune in next week when Cloud has his first experience of the upper class.**


	5. New Class

**Disclaimer: I own nothing, its Squaresoft/Square Enix's house; I'm just rearranging the attic.**

**Hello, I'm back with another chapter, enjoy watching Cloud get pranked.**

Chapter 5 – New Class

Seph woke up and instantly went to wake Cloud up, only to notice he wasn't there. He jumped up and grabbed a snoring Brother by the collar of his PJ's.

"Where's Cloud" he asked quietly, but with Venom.

"I not know what you talk about" Brother replied with his poor English.

"Hey, what's goin' on ya?" Wakka asked getting up.

"Cloud's gone" Sephiroth said sharply, and with a little worry.

"Calm down dude, maybe he just got up before you" Irvine suggested.

Seph chuckled "Not likely, he's a rock" he said.

"Well, just put Brother down and let's look for him first" Gippal said, forcing Seph's fingers to loosen.

They checked on the girls first, Shuyin going in with a hand over his eyes, it turned out that Aeris was missing too.

"Hmmm, maybe they snuck out" Tifa suggested.

"You really don't know my brother do you?" Sephiroth called from the hallway.

"Or Aeris" Lulu added sleepily.

"She's got a point there T, Aeris ain't the type to sneak out … especially with a guy" Yuffie pointed out.

Next they checked downstairs and the search was ended when the missing teens were found in the living room asleep on the sofa.

Sephiroth was about to wake them up, when Baralai held him back.

"I've got an idea, Rikku can I borrow your camera?" he whispered.

Rikku snuck away and came back with a self developing camera.

"Take the photo as they are, or in a more compromising position?" Gippal whispered, snickering.

Without answering Tidus and Shuyin gently picked them up, laid Cloud on the sofa and placed Aeris on top of him, so that her head was between his legs and vice versa.

Sephiroth took the camera "Smile" he murmured and took the picture; the noise of the camera woke them up "Bloody hell that's loud!" Seph exclaimed.

"WHAT THE HELL!!!" their victims yelled at the same time while Seph quickly handed the photo to Tifa, who hid it in Cid's inside jacket pocket.

"I'm gonna enjoy using that to my advantage" Tidus said clutching his sides with laughter.

Aeris quickly and silently got off Cloud and ran upstairs.

"I'm _so_ gonna kill you guys" Cloud said dangerously.

Yuna came downstairs "What did you lot do to Aeris!" she demanded "she's crying!"

Tifa fetched the picture and Yuna frowned "Baralai's idea, the twins got them like that and Seph took the shot" she explained quickly.

"Well right now Aeris thinks that Cloud did something" Yuna told them, without a word, Cloud charged up the stairs, grabbing the picture in the process, and knocked on Rikku's bedroom door.

Paine answered "I think you've done enough here, go away" she said in a monotone, she was about to close the door in his face when Cloud handed her the photo.

"One word, 'prank'" he said and waited patiently.

Paine closed the door and examined the photo.

"According to Cloud the two of you were pranked, how did you fall asleep again?" she asked Aeris.

"I'm not sure" she said wiping her eyes "sitting up I think".

"You fell asleep on my shoulder and I fell asleep shortly after … with my arm around you" Cloud called through the door.

"It wouldn't surprise me if the twins pulled something like this" Lenne added.

"They did" Yuna confirmed as she walked in, closing the door in Cloud's face "it was Baralai's idea" Paine frowned and left the room "Tidus and Shuyin put you and Cloud in the position you woke up in and Sephiroth took the picture" with that Aeris got up and let Cloud in.

"I'm sorry" she said.

"What for?" he asked.

"Thinking that you'd do something like that?"

"Well, you've nothing to worry about; I'd never try something like that"

"Oh hurry up and kiss already" Yuffie yelled "I wanna get dressed"

"She's got a point, we've got to get ready for school" Aeris said, Cloud simply blushed, nodded and left. After he'd gone Aeris rounded on Yuffie "And what makes you think I like him?"

"It's obvious even to her" Lulu answered.

Aeris reddened "W-w-well … he obviously doesn't like me back" she mumbled, looking at the floor.

Yuna stood up and hugged her "Honey of course he does, he's just shy. Shuyin's told me that Tidus was like that with his first girlfriend, which probably means that Cloud's never been with anyone before".

"Couldn't you tell anything from that kiss last night?" Lenne added.

"Well that was Spin the Bottle, he had to kiss me" Aeris countered.

"Not necessarily, he could have forfeited, besides, whenever he had to kiss a girl during that game it was always just a quick peck, even Tifa before you try saying it was just cause you're single" Lulu stated.

Yuffie paused, halfway through picking up a clean bra "What I missed something from last night" everyone else nodded and she threw her bra on the floor in anger, not caring that she was completely topless "DAMMIT, why did I go to bed, why?" she cried.

"Uhhh, Yuffie, you might want to get that on" Aeris said, pointing to the bra.

Yuffie shook her head "Not until you spill, how was it, is he a good kisser?"

Aeris blushed, but nodded anyway "It was the best kiss I've ever had, most of the ones I got from Zak were kinda forced and he was always groping at me" Yuffie accepted that and continued getting dressed.

During the morning there was a phone call; Cid told Sephiroth that Tiler was dropping off their weapons on his way to work, since they forgot them the previous night.

Everyone had breakfast and started leaving.

"Hey I forgot, lemme look at your timetable Cloud" Seph said, Cloud handed over the sheet of paper "Aha, you're in our class, I noticed that each year has two classes" hearing that Rikku quickly wiped out her timetable and compared it to Cloud's.

She let out a sigh of relief "I'm in the same class too" she exclaimed.

"Hey, wait up you two" Tiler called from astride Speedy.

"Hey Dad, I thought you were dropping those off at school" Sephiroth said, accepting Masamune.

"No I meant at Rikku's, which reminds me, who the hell is that guy with the Mohawk?" Tiler asked Rikku.

"That's Brother … my brother" she replied, worrying about what he'd done this time.

"Well you can tell him from me, if he ever tries to hump Speedy's leg again I'll leave the scratches that Speedy gives him to rot"

Rikku grinned at him "Go right ahead, he just get's on my nerves, and I'll add animals to the list of things he prefers to girls other than his cousin" she said, crossing her arms.

Tiler rode off to work leaving the teens walking to school.

"That is so cool, you guys have a chocobo" Yuna said dreamily.

"What's so great about chocobos? They never do as they're told and crap all over the place; cars are much better" Seph stated matter-of-factly.

"Yeah but cars just destroy the environment" Cloud countered "I'd choose a chocobo over a car any day".

"Well let's not get started, we'll never agree on this subject" Sephiroth replied with a sigh.

"I wish I had a chocobo" Aeris said, Seph rolled his eyes.

"So do I" Cloud thought aloud causing Sephiroth to slap a palm into his forehead and run his fingers through his hair.

"Yep, I give it a week until he asks her out" Rikku whispered to Gippal.

"Need a hand giving them a slight nudge in the right direction?" Lulu asked, listening in to the conversation. They started scheming.

When they got to school Cloud and Rikku were informed that they had to change lockers, Cloud's was next to Aeris' and Rikku's was next to Yuna's.

It turned out that Cloud and Rikku had a complete repeat of the previous day, starting with Alchemy.

Cid took the register, most of the Crusaders were in this class, sat at the front and unfortunately some of the git squad were there too.

"Now as you should know your homework from yesterday was an essay on what you get from mixing an ether with a mega phoenix and the results of using that item. There are only two people that I'll be allowing to not hand it in, because when I handed this assignment out they were in a lower class" Cid smiled at Cloud and Rikku "But maybe they can give me a quick answer, Cloud what do you get from mixing those two ingredients?"

"That would be a Freedom sir" he answered coolly.

"Correct, and Rikku what are the results of using it?" Cid asked.

"It reduces the MP costs of one ally to zero" she answered with a grin.

"Correct, now I'll be taking those essays now and any names of whoever's not done it so you can come back for detention" Cid announced and started moving around the class room picking up sheets of paper, it turned out that Ormi, Logos and Nooj were in detention after school that day.

The class went by smoothly, they had a practical lesson on creating a home made ether and at the end of the lesson they were to test them.

Now they were walking to History.

"Thank god we were allowed to help each other, Cloud you saved my life" Tidus said loudly, Cloud just bowed jokingly.

"Anyway, you were wrong about one thing Shu" Cloud said.

"Oh, what's that?" Shuyin asked.

Ormi shoved his way through the middle of the group and Rufus Shinra said "Out of the way vermin"

"The git squad _does_ hang out after school, in detention" Cloud answered Shuyin loudly, causing the Crusaders to snort in laughter.

Ormi, Logos and Nooj stopped dead in the hallway, Ormi turned to Cloud.

"Listen here Geek, nobody calls us that and says stuff like that without paying for it" Nooj yelled.

"Oh. Really? So sorry, lemme check how much cash I've got" Cloud called back and checked his wallet "I've only got about five Gil, will that do?" the Crusaders burst into laughter.

Ormi just snapped, but since Auron was walking down the hall Logos, Nooj, Rufus and Seymour held him back "Just wait until combat class, you're dead" Seymour spat.

They walked off "Uhhh, if they're in our class, how come they don't know about yesterday's combat class?" Cloud asked in slight confusion.

"They skived off the lesson" Gippal pointed out "I really hate Nooj, he used to be a friend, but ditched us for that bitch Leblanc"

"Well it seems that they're in for a big surprise" Cloud said with a smirk and they continued to History class.

For the Crusaders, it was nothing short of disastrous, Maechen couldn't tell the difference between Tidus, Shuyin and Cloud, he even went so far as to call Cloud Mr Watanuki, which was the twin's surname.

Other than that the lesson went rather smoothly, Maechen only forgot where he was twice, but everyone, who was paying attention at least, managed to understand that he was explaining an event from about a century ago where fiends fell from the moon and landed on the continent of Esthar and attacked its capital city, which was also called Esthar.

While they were writing down some notes from the board on the kinds of fiends of that time, Cloud overheard Rufus bragging to his friends, quietly though, just in case Maechen wasn't as deaf as he seemed.

"The old man's an idiot, he should've retired before we were even born, forcibly at least. Good news though, I've complained to father enough to have him arrange an inspection of all staff, that codger will be gone by the end of the week" he told the git squad who all either exchanged high fives, punched the air or hissed "yes".

After class Cloud filled everyone else in on what he heard, they weren't too surprised.

"Shu told me that they were trying something like that about a week ago" Tidus told him.

"Isn't there anything that we can do about it?" Seph asked and the others shook their heads.

They went to the cafeteria for break to meet up with Yuffie and Lenne. But Cloud was surprised to see Yuffie locked in lip combat with a blond haired guy with a black, spiky tattoo on the right hand side of his face, he was wearing a black t-shirt, a red sleeveless jacket and blue shorts that went just past his knees. He was also wearing black, fingerless gloves with some kind of metal over his knuckles.

"Hi Yuffie, who's this" asked Seph, gesturing to the blond kid, he wiped his hand on his shorts, just to make sure it was clean, and held it out.

"I'm Zell" he said, Sephiroth accepted the offered hand.

"Ah, you were mentioned last night … something about why Yuffie wouldn't play Spin the Bottle" Seph said with a chuckle.

"Yep that's me, we're with you next right?" Zell asked holding Yuffie in one arm.

"Wait, what?" Cloud exclaimed in surprise.

"Yeah, sorry forgot to mention it ya" Wakka said, scratching the back of his head "once a week the upper three years mix, Zell's in Yuffie's and Lenne's class and they'll be with us and your old class for combat today".

"Why do I get the feeling that the git squad's gonna cause trouble with the younger crowd?"

"Probably because you're right Cloud" Lenne answered "They pick on me more than anyone else because I'm a pacifist"

"So why come to combat class at all?" Seph asked.

"Well, Mr Kimahri is teaching me how to use defensive singing and dancing to fend off fiends" Lenne answered, Sephiroth blinked in confusion.

Lenne demonstrated by doing a quick jig and Seph found himself unable to see.

"WHAT THE!!" he yelled.

"And if you were a fiend I'd be able to run away now" Lenne explained with a smile while Rikku mixed a couple of things and cured Seph's blindness.

He saw the funny side and laughed "Well I'd say you're getting good" he stroked his chin thoughtfully "Could you do a dance or a song to make more than one person blinded?" she nodded "Then I've got an idea" everyone moved in to listen to his plan.

After break everyone headed for the combat class gym, picking up their weapons along the way, it turned out that Zell was a fist fighter like Tifa.

Inside the changing room the male git squad moved over to Cloud and he sized them up, Ormi used a shield, Logos was a gunner as was Nooj, Seymour was a mage, it was unclear as yet if he was black or white, or even both. Seifer was a gunblade wielder like Squall, Raijin used a staff like Baralai, and Rufus was a gunner.

Noticing that he was surrounded, he looked at them coldly "Can I help you?" he asked he hadn't removed his sword from its case.

"Yeah, I wanna put your face in that wall" Ormi shouted, then bellowed his usual laugh.

Cloud looked at the wall, then back to Ormi "I don't fancy that" he got out his sword "thanks" he pointed it at Ormi's throat.

Ormi got his shield off his back and got into his stance.

"ALRIGHT! Save fighting for gym" Kimahri ordered.

As everyone walked past him Kimahri stopped Cloud.

"Is something the matter sir?" he asked.

"How does Cloud feel about taking three opponents at once?" Kimahri enquired.

"Child's play. Who did you have in mind?"

"Ormi, Logos and Seifer"

Cloud smirked "It'll be my pleasure, sir" he said and they walked into class as the girls came in, Lenne was clutching a small microphone stand, Yuffie had a huge throwing star as did Fujin of the git squad and Leblanc had a fan of all things, except her fan had claws on it, like the day before there were gasps at the size of Cloud's and Seph's swords.

"To start lesson, Cloud will demonstrate one against many combat, Seifer, Ormi, Logos discus battle plan. Cloud warm-up with Sephiroth, remember _warm-up_ not try to kill each other" Kimahri announced.

As his opponents huddled together Cloud did a few warm-up exercises with his brother along with a little sparring.

After five minutes Cloud was called to face his enemy, Logos was on his left, Ormi was in the middle and Seifer was on his right.

Logos was going to move first, Cloud could tell. He opened fire, for the sake of safety in class gunners had to use rubber bullets, which was lucky for Leblanc because Cloud moved like lightning and deflected the bullet with his sword, straight into her nose. It broke.

She was lucky that Fujin knew how to perform a simple cure spell, because no one else was going to help her.

Cloud's opponents however were just shocked, he took that to his advantage, he charged at Logos but was blocked by Ormi and his shield. Ormi tried to send Cloud flying but wasn't fast enough, Cloud launched himself off the shield and into the air; he then used his meteor rain technique to attack all of his opponents at once with huge ricks from nowhere.

They staggered slightly, Ormi had defended Logos again and Seifer had deflected most of the rocks with his gunblade, they were winded, but still able to fight 'good' Cloud thought 'I've only just started'.

This time Seifer attacked, he and Cloud traded attacks. Cloud was faster, regardless of the fact that his sword was heavier, eventually Seifer was exhausted enough for Cloud to stick his sword in the ground pivoted on the handle and kicked Seifer in the head. He stumbled back and Cloud used his blade beam, he swung his sword from behind his back, causing a blue arc of energy to shoot at Seifer, it was a direct hit which knocked him out, but as soon as it hit Seifer, two more arcs shot at Ormi and Logos, again direct hits.

"Enough" Kimahri called "now, who can tell Kimahri how Cloud won?"

Most of the class was dumbstruck; Sephiroth, Shuyin and Lenne raised their hands. Kimahri nodded at Lenne.

"Because his opponents underestimated him?" she said nervously.

"Correct" Kimahri answered and nodded to Shuyin.

"Because he's more agile" he stated a little more confidently than his girlfriend.

"Yes" Kimahri finally nodded at Sephiroth.

"Because his opponents failed to plan properly, they were ill-trained and that showed by their shock at him deflecting bullets, because they failed to fight as the team they were meant to have been. Then again they were skilled in their respective fields, Logos' aim was perfect, right between Cloud's eyes, Ormi defended his comrades to perfection and Seifer could possibly give me a run for my money, but as a team, they sucked" Seph explained in detail.

"Ouch, harsh man" Zell exclaimed.

"But true, you three must work on teamwork; your homework is that, Kimahri expects improvement by next week. TEAM UP!" Kimahri yelled.

Zell and Tifa went together because they could only practice marshal arts on each other when it came to offence.

The class went alright, Cloud and Seph assisting the youngest students with battle stances, they paid especial attention to Lenne, showing her how to dodge attacks in case her dances and singing had a limited effect or if her opponent started attacking randomly. They also informed the Crusaders that the plan was off since the git squad had suffered enough humiliation for today.

Lunch went smoother than it did yesterday, thankfully no incidents, the Crusaders weren't permitted to pull any tables together because an extra long table was commissioned for them, by Auron, which seated twenty people.

Rikku and Gippal were fixing where every was sitting and thanks to Lulu they were able to do so subtly, which resulted in Aeris being sat next to Cloud again.

After lunch they all, minus Lenne, Yuffie and Zell, had English with Mr Biggs. He was an alright teacher but Sephiroth always found the subject more boring than a rainy graveyard, he fell asleep. Lucky for him Cloud had a copy of his notes and woke him up whenever he started to snore, with a kick to his chair.

Then there was maths with Mr Wedge this time it was Wakka's turn to grab some sleep, only this time nobody was keeping extra notes for him, and he got caught.

"Wakka I know you can never keep track of this subject, but at least try to stay awake in my class" Mr Wedge asked resignedly.

After that it was magic, Cloud and Rikku spent the entire class catching up on what they had missed from the previous year and yesterday, Cloud also found out what Seph meant when he said that Lulu rocked at the subject.

Miss Trepe was teaching the class how to perform a firaja spell, Lulu was the first person to get it right and the plant that she was practising on was obliterated, but unlike anyone else she was able to bring her plant back to life and try it again.

Finally they had double sports with Mr Wallace, who had lost his right arm a long time ago, now he had a bionic arm that could morph into a Gatling cannon.

"Listen up, today we're doin' basketball, guys an' girls split up an' I'll sort you into teams" he called to the class.

There was only one incident during that class, Rufus decided to trip Cloud while Mr Wallace's back was turned, then dived to the floor and tried to claim that Cloud had tripped him, Seph had to exercise a lot of self control to not pummel Rufus there and then.

After that they returned to their lockers to drop off their books, picked up their weapons from the weapons office and went home, Rikku going with the Strife brothers again.

Another day done with.

**Right now I need help, I can't think of a way for Cloud to get back at Tidus and Shuyin, ok I tell a lie, I can think of stuff, but nothing that's brilliant, please leave suggestions in your reviews, thank you.**


	6. Birthday Surprises

**Hi everyone, I'm back with another update, I apologise for the longness of this one, I've only just found out myself that its fifteen pages long … enjoy!**

Chapter 6 – Birthday Surprises

They got home and instantly Cloud asked Jen about an item to do their magic homework on, he, Rikku and Seph were given the task of perfecting their firaja spells by next lesson.

"Cloud, can't we just do this after dinner?" Seph asked.

"Well I can't, Pop's coming to pick me up after dinner and there ain't nothing for me to practise on there" Rikku piped up.

Seph mumbled something about over enthusiastic students and followed as his mother led them to the back garden and his Dad's target range, she set up the targets to just sit at a safe distance and left them to it, saying that they only had about an hour and a half until they had to wash up for dinner.

They practised on the paper targets and only one thing went wrong, Seph accidently singed Cloud's eyebrows and Cloud retaliated by setting Sephiroth's hair on fire, Rikku doused the fire with a water spell and ran inside for some ingredients to fix the damage with.

But now the boys were plastered with mud from the scuffle that Seph started to avenge his hair, even though Rikku's mix had grown it back, and Jen was ordering them to go wash … their entire bodies.

Half an hour later Rikku watched at Seph came downstairs, this time all his hair dripping on the floor.

"Seriously Seph, haven't you ever heard of a hair dryer?" Rikku asked with a giggle, he just scowled at her.

"Tiler won't allow him to use one, he thinks that it will damage his scalp" Jen answered for her son.

"And I agree with him" Sephiroth added.

"But couldn't you at least use a towel?"

"And get it all tangled? I think not Rikku" Sephiroth answered in a mock posh voice.

"How long until dinner's ready Mum? WAA!" Cloud yelled as he slipped on the puddle Seph's hair had created.

"SEPHIROTH STRIFE, CLEAN THAT UP RIGHT NOW! Cloud, sweetheart, are you ok?" Jen asked in concern.

Cloud got away from the mini pool before he answered "I will be" he said.

Tiler came in, nearly broke his neck due to the pool and sat at the table while Sephiroth cleaned it up.

They ate dinner while talking about that day at school, Tiler and Jen weren't too impressed by what the git squad got up to, and Tiler was somewhat proud of how Cloud handled them in combat class.

After dinner Tiler seemed to remember something "Oh Cloud, it's your turn to clean out Speedy's paddock, off you go" he said with a grin on his face.

Cloud was a little suspicious, but went anyway.

As he neared the paddock he heard cooing, which was normal for Speedy, but it sounded different, something was cooing back. Cloud quickened his pace and found that Speedy was cooing over another chocobo, clearly a female that had a reddish tinge to her feathers.

Cloud ran back to the dining room "Where'd that other chocobo come from?" he asked, slightly shocked.

"Happy birthday son" Tiler answered, Rikku looked at Cloud with hurt in her eyes.

"You never told me it was your birthday today" Rikku complained.

"That's cause his birthday's not till tomorrow, what gives Dad" Seph asked heatedly.

"Well I knew that Cloud's always wanted a chocobo of his own and I got him one, partly as his birthday present and partly to congratulate him on advancing to a more advanced class" Tiler answered calmly, causing Cloud to tackle him.

"THANK YOU THANK YOU THANKYOU!!!!!" he cried.

Sephiroth rolled his eyes "Wait, does that mean I can have a car for my next birthday?" he asked with hope in his eyes.

"No, you know how I feel about those … _things_" his father answered sharply.

"What, not even one of those eco-friendly cars that run off their own, self-charging batteries?" Seph argued.

Before Tiler could blow his top, Jen started massaging his shoulders "We'll think about that one, won't we dear" she said, giving her husband a 'because I say so' look.

He sighed "Alright, we'll think about it, happy?" Seph was beaming.

"So what's her name?" Cloud asked.

"Sunstroke" Tiler answered, glad to be off the subject of cars "But be warned Cloud, she perfectly capable of breeding with Speedy, so if we find out that she's carrying, you are not to ride her. However I'd prefer it if you still walked her to school and back, she'd need the exercise" he explained.

"They allow chocobos at school?" Rikku asked in confusion.

"Yes, Auron's had a chorale there for years, or so he told me" Tiler answered.

"There's one problem" Cloud stated "she's big enough for two riders; they'll be arguments as to who I ride her with".

Jen seemed to find that slightly funny, but she never got the chance to voice her opinion because there was a knock at the door.

Checking the time Rikku said "That'll be Pop" and got up to leave.

"Hey Dad, can I give Rikku a lift home?" Cloud asked, obviously eager to ride Sunstroke.

"Yes, but I'm coming with you, Speedy took a liking to her the moment he saw her. And I think she's the same, they'll have to get used to being separated from time to time, so about half way there I'll turn around and head home" Tiler answered.

Rikku squealed and hopped up and down on the spot, clapping her hands rapidly "I'll ask Pop" she said loudly and with that she was gone … and back in a few seconds "he says it's ok".

"Right then" Tiler said "LET'S RIDE!" he finished in a cowboy accent.

There was a bit of a struggle with separating Sunstroke and Speedy, but eventually Tiler had left the paddock on Speedy and Cloud and Rikku followed him on Sunstroke's back.

Slowing down to ride alongside his son Tiler asked "how's she handling?"

"Brilliantly" Cloud answered "how're you doing Rikku?" she just grinned happily.

"Ok then, Rikku which way to your house?" Tiler asked, she pointed "ok then, try getting her to run on ahead".

Cloud nodded and squeezed his ankles gently into her sides, which caused her to speed up into a run.

Tiler had some trouble getting Speedy not to run after them, but eventually the bird got the message "Don't worry laddie, she'll be back tonight" he told his steed softly, once Speedy had calmed down, they returned home.

By the time Cloud had gotten Rikku home, Sunstroke had noticed that Speedy wasn't with them and had started to panic slightly, but Cloud was always good at calming Speedy down whenever he got scared, he managed to keep her going.

They got home, Cid wasn't there yet because he was walking as they rode past him, but he wasn't far behind because he started running.

"Uhhh, can we wait until Pop get's back?" Rikku asked.

"Why exactly?" Cloud asked back.

"Well there's kinda two reasons why I waited for Pop to come home with me, first he doesn't like me walking home by myself after school, cause he doesn't trust the neighbourhood" she started, Cloud nodded in understanding and for her to continue "and secondly I worry about what Brother might do you know?"

"You mean he might just get interested in you as well as Yuna?" Cloud asked and she nodded.

"He never tries anything on Yuna when Pop's around, so I'd feel safer if we waited for him" but they never got that chance, because Brother came outside, drooling slightly at the sight of Sunstroke.

"Hmmm, pretty bird" he started moving towards her leg, not even knowing that Cloud and Rikku were there.

"Uhhh, Brother, she's a female" Cloud said as if speaking to a child, Brother then screamed like a girl and ran into the house, leaving Cloud and Rikku laughing like hyenas when Cid turned up.

"What the hell's so funny, I don't run that often" he yelled, slightly out of breath.

"Oh just Brother" Rikku answered and allowed her father to help her off of Sunstroke.

Cid stroked Sunstroke before saying "Damn fine bird, thanks for givin' my baby girl a ride home Cloud."

Rikku stroked her feathers too, and gave her neck a few scratches, to which Sunstroke cooed contentedly "Yeah thanks for the lift Cloud, see ya tomorrow" she said, and ran into the house.

"See you tomorrow sir, hopefully at a different time of day for once" Cloud said with a chuckle.

Cid just laughed and waved him off.

Cloud ran Sunstroke all the way home, which she enjoyed; it was cool to find that she was faster than Speedy.

"You're back sooner than I expected" Jen said when Cloud walked in.

"Yeah, Sunstroke's definitely faster than Speedy, but there's a bit of bad news" Cloud announced.

"What?" Tiler asked.

Cloud held up a piece of paper "I got a speeding ticket for out running a police car, just a warning mind, but still" he handed the ticket to his now chuckling father, Jen wasn't impressed.

"Well at least you know to watch your speed, maybe we need to get you a chocobo speedometer" she suggested.

"That's what the officer said, the only reason I didn't get a fine was because I didn't know how fast I was going" Cloud answered.

Seph came down the stairs, mid way through the conversation "I'm sorry but, what have I missed?" he asked.

Cloud sighed "I got a speeding ticket" Sephiroth fell down and started laughing hysterically.

"Alright that's enough, have you two got any homework to do?" Tiler demanded.

"Just practise on the firaja spell and we did that before dinner" Cloud answered.

"There was something else but I told Mr Wallace that I couldn't do it" Seph added.

"What?" Jen asked.

"I, and probably Cloud too, have to practise holding my breath under water, for Blitzball" he said "but I told my teacher that I couldn't do it because we don't have a pool here" he finished.

"Well why didn't you say so, we can get a pool in the back yard, I take it the one they have at school is an indoor pool?" Tiler asked and Seph nodded "right, find out as much as you can about it, the temperature they keep it at and such and I'll get some people in to build one for us".

"Uhhh, slight problem there, they've got a sphere pool at school, and they're expensive to run, or so I'm told" Seph informed his father.

"Ah, well we'll see how things go, in the mean time, it's getting late and I've got work early in the morning, so goodnight" Tiler said.

"Well you two know the rules, you're father goes to bed, you go to bed, off you go" Jen ordered.

"I hate it when you treat us like children" Seph complained, but did as he was told. On his way he noticed the time "WHAT! It's only 9 pm! YOU CALL THAT LATE!!!" he exploded.

Jen just gave him one of her more dangerous looks and he then went quietly.

Cloud found he was unable to sleep that night; his thoughts kept returning to that night when he and Aeris had kissed playing Spin the Bottle and slept on the sofa together.

When he heard noises in the back yard he got up to investigate, and found his parents in the garden with about five other people. They were using magic to dig up the garden.

"What's going on?" Cloud asked, making his parents jump and drop the dirt they were levitating.

"We're digging out the space for the pool, now don't go thinking that this is part of your birthday present Cloud, it's for both you and Sephiroth to practise Blitzball, which can be done in an ordinary pool." Jen told him.

"Why aren't you asleep?" Tiler asked him suspiciously.

"Too much on my mind" Cloud answered with a shrug.

"Hmm, well at least try sweetheart, ok. Oh and I want to meet the rest of your friends tomorrow" Jen said with a smile.

"Well the pool will be ready by the time they get home from school tomorrow, how about a pool party?" Tiler suggested.

"Really?" Cloud asked in delight, his parents nodded and he grinned devilishly "Seph's gonna hate me for this" Cloud thought aloud.

"That's why we're going to ask him to offer a sleepover to them" Tiler said "makes it fair then".

Cloud nodded and went back inside to try and sleep, but only managed a few hours.

It was 6 am, at least an hour before Seph usually woke him up. Cloud walked downstairs and got himself a bowl of cereal, he'd just sat down when his mother walked in.

"You're up early" she pointed out.

"Yeah, I think I've been up since half past five" he said sleepily "there was someone I couldn't stop thinking about" he added.

Jen stopped mid-way through cracking open an egg "Oh?" she asked, an eyebrow raised questioningly.

"She's a girl in my class that I met on our first day, and her name's Aeris. But I don't think she likes me … not _that_ way at least" he continued to eat his cereal while Jen continued to make the family's traditional birthday boy's feast.

"Have you asked her" Jen asked while frying some sausages to go with the eggs and bacon that she'd already finished, when Cloud told her 'no' she sighed "well then, how can you possibly know she doesn't like you?"

"I don't know, she's never dropped any hints" he whined.

"Cloud, teenage girls don't give hints that they like someone, unless the guy they're after goes too slow or they're sluts" Jen told him exasperatedly.

Cloud finished his cereal, lost in his own thoughts. Since his cooked breakfast wasn't ready yet he decided to go and wake his brother up.

Just as he got to Seph's bedroom door, his brother stepped out. As soon as he noticed Cloud standing there he blinked, rubbed his eyes and blinked again. "Who are you and where's Cloud" he demanded as it was _his_ job to wake _Cloud_ up in the mornings, not the other way around.

Cloud simply shrugged "I couldn't sleep" he said honestly "what do you think about Aeris?"

Seph stared at Cloud in confusion, then he smirked "Ah growing up at last, happy birthday Cloud" he said, clapping a hand on his brother's shoulder.

Cloud punched him playfully "shut up" he commanded.

"You going to ask her out?" Seph asked as they came down the stairs.

Cloud sighed "I dunno, man I'm not even sure if she likes me" he exclaimed.

"Cloud, just try it" Seph said in a semi-persuasive voice "ok, make you a deal, you ask out Aeris and I'll ask out Tifa."

That caught Cloud off guard "Where'd _that_ come from?"

"What can I say, she's hot. And that kiss from Rikku's sleepover was the best _I've_ ever had in my life" he answered as they entered the kitchen.

"Well considering how many girls you've had, that's saying a lot" Jen said loudly, just to be heard over the sound of her frying.

Seph got himself some cereal and noticed something in the garden "Mother? Did we get a new shed last night?" he asked.

"No, that's the pool, it should be filled with warm water by the time you get home from school" Jen answered while serving Cloud's breakfast.

"Cool! Pool party tonight" Seph announced.

"No, that's Cloud's job, _you_ can offer a sleepover afterwards" Tiler announced as he walked in "I've asked Auron to contact your friend's parents for me and they've agreed, your friends just have to ask tonight."

"How many can we expect at most?" Jen asked.

"Besides us?" Seph asked.

Cloud counted on his fingers "Eighteen, I think … do I really have _that_ many friends?"

His parents and brother all smiled warmly at him.

"How does it feel to be popular?" Seph asked with a grin.

Cloud grinned back "Fantastic!"

They ate breakfast and Sephiroth gave Cloud his present, a book on the care and breeding of chocobos. Cloud was over the moon.

Cloud offered Seph a ride to school, but he declined and told Cloud to ride on, mainly because he had to find the chorale and partly because he hated riding, it made his groin ache.

Along his way to school Seph saw Tifa and Aeris and ran to them.

"Hi you two … do you live together or something, you seem to go everywhere together" he asked, scratching his head in thought.

"No Seph, we live next door to each other" Tifa answered.

"Oh … Aeris, what do you think of my brother?" Sephiroth asked, seeming random.

"W-w-what!" she stammered.

"Do you think he's good looking, dog-ugly, is he a nice guy? What do you think of Cloud?" he explained with a smirk.

"W-well I think he's nice, he smart and drop-dead gorgeous … but he doesn't like me" Aeris answered while blushing, Tifa just rolled her eyes.

"Aeris, he's head over heels for you, the guy would take his head off with a blunt saw if you asked him to!" she exclaimed, throwing her hands in the air.

"Hmmm, Tifa's right, but I just wanted to be sure that Cloud was wrong" Seph said plainly.

"What!" Aeris cried.

"I tried to convince him that he should try and ask you out and he said that you didn't like him that way. Now I know he's wrong" Sephiroth replied.

"Speaking of Cloud, where is he? Is he ill?" Tifa asked, since Aeris was speechless.

"No, he's not ill; he's riding his new chocobo Sunstroke into school" Seph answered.

"He got a chocobo?" Aeris burst out.

"Yes and _her_ name is Sunstroke" Seph answered and Aeris sped up to get to school sooner and see Sunstroke sooner.

"You had to say it. How come Cloud got a chocobo anyway?" Tifa answered.

"Half birthday present, half reward for getting into our class" he answered.

"Hmmm, I didn't know it was his birthday today" she mused.

"Well it is, don't feel bad about it, he's not used to anyone other than his family caring about it. That reminds me, how would you feel about me asking you out?" he asked, being direct.

"Sure thing, why?" Tifa answered, being equally direct.

"Cause I promised Cloud that if he asked Aeris out, I'd ask you" he told her.

"Seems fair I suppose, but do you actually like me? Is there something in it for you?" she asked coyly.

"Well, yeah. Nobody's ever given me a kiss like you did at Rikku's, you seem so much like me, you know outgoing, funny, skilled in combat etcetera, and just for an added bonus, you're hot!" he finished, raising his voice a little.

She laughed "That's true I suppose" she gave him a quick kiss and ran to catch up with her friend, but he grabbed her arm and pulled her back "What!"

"Can we keep this to ourselves, just until Cloud and Aeris get together?" he asked.

She nodded and they both ran to catch Aeris.

Cloud had just finished making sure that Sunstroke wouldn't escape the chorale and was heading to the weapons office, then class.

But he didn't get there as soon as he hoped since he was ambushed by the entire git squad.

"BWAA HA HA" Ormi bellowed "Got you alone" he cracked his knuckles "You're gonna pay for combat class yesterday!"

Cloud simply put his case down and got out his buster sword. He calmly separated the main blade from the secondary one and got into a different stance from normal. His main blade was in his right hand and sticking out to the side and the secondary was pointing at Ormi's throat from a distance.

"Bring it on" he said coldly, little did any on them know that Auron was watching the whole thing.

Logos took aim, but his gun was shot out of his hand by Yuna while Wakka arrived at Cloud's side, a spiked ball under his arm.

"Figured you could use a hand ya?" he said as Yuna joined them.

"You think we can take them?" she asked.

"Now that you two are here, easily" Cloud answered with a smirk and charged at Seifer, but was blocked by Raijin and Fujin.

Wakka threw his ball at Ormi and he blocked the attack with his shield, so the ball bounced into Nooj, knocking him unconscious.

Yuna started shooting her rubber bullets at Seymour and he used a protect spell on himself to deflect the attack, so Lulu stepped in and used a firaja spell, Seymour was unconscious.

Cloud was fighting Raijin, Fujin and Seifer simultaneously, and having the time of his life.

Raijin tried to use his staff to take Cloud's feet from under him, but he jumped and Raijin's took Fujin's from under her and she fell forwards.

While in mid-air Cloud spun and kicked Raijin in the head, he twirled around and smacked his face on Ormi's shield and was knocked out by it. After kicking Raijin, Cloud pulled his sword back together and used his Braver attack on Seifer, who tried to block it, but snapped his wrist instead.

Fujin tried to attack Cloud from behind but Yuffie took her out.

After that the rest of the Crusaders turned up and the git squad ran for it.

"This isn't the last you've seen from The Brotherhood of Bullies" Leblanc yelled as she ran.

"Seems the git squad's got a new name for themselves" Tidus said.

"Well they _did_ hate being the git squad" Zell pointed out.

"Besides, The Brotherhood sounds catchy" someone said.

"Yeah you got that right Dona" a beefy voice rumbled.

"And who are you exactly?" Seph asked.

"I'm Dona Greene and this is my boyfriend Barthello" she girl answered snobbishly, she was dark skinned, and hardly wore anything. It was surprising that you couldn't see her tits "we're new here and I'm the one who came up with the new name for your 'git squad'".

"You're members?" Wakka asked stupidly.

"Yeah, got somethin' to say about it!" Barthello yelled. He was only slightly smaller than Ormi, only in his case he it was all muscle and no fat.

Cloud and Seph got into their battle stances "Do you?" they asked together.

"Awe maybe later" she said as if speaking to children "Barthello we're leaving!" she snapped and started to walk away, be followed her like a lost dog.

"Well it's obvious who's in charge of _that_ relationship" Rikku laughed, everyone else agreed.

"Happy birthday Cloud" Tifa and Rikku said with a laugh.

"It's your birthday?" everyone else, except Seph, asked.

"Uhhh, yeah" Cloud answered, scratching his neck.

"Ah, so that's why you've gotten a chocobo" Aeris mused "Can I see her?" she asked.

"Yeah, sure I can give you a ride home after school if you like. That reminds me, my parents have bought a pool for me and Seph to do our Blitzball homework in, but I've been told to ask you guys over for a pool party tonight" Cloud told them.

"And my job's to ask you guys to a sleepover afterwards" Seph added.

The others said they'd ask their parents after school and they continued to class.

Cloud's class had single combat followed by maths. In maths he was sat between Rikku and Aeris.

Whilst Mr Wedge had his back turned Rikku passed Cloud a note.

_Are you planning on asking Aeris out?_

Cloud looked at the note, then, after checking that Mr Wedge wasn't looking, wrote back.

_I was thinking on it, why?_

He passed the piece of paper back; she read it and wrote back.

_Meet me at the chocobo chorale at break. I'll help you out, promise._

"Since this is the first time I've caught either of you passing notes in class I'll let it slide, but next time I'll be reading out your messages to the class" Mr Wedge whispered in their ears, making them jump "on a lighter note, many happy returns Mr Strife, and good luck" he patted Cloud's shoulder and continued checking his student's work and helping with problems, as well as waking Wakka up again.

At break Cloud met Rikku and could've punched her, she brought Aeris with her.

"Hi Cloud. Aeris, wait here, Cloud a word" she commanded, he followed and she started whispering "what's your plan?"

"Not to have been ambushed like this" he hissed.

"Ok, here's what you need to do, just go up to her and say 'Aeris, would you be my date tonight?' it's that simple" she stated, trying not to be heard by Aeris.

"Yeah, for Sephiroth" Cloud complained, but Rikku wasn't listening, she was shoving him back to Aeris.

"Aeris, Cloud's got something to ask you" she said and gave him a quick nudge.

"Uhhh, Aeris? Would you Uhhh…" he started.

"Oh for Yevon's sake, Aeris will you go out with him? I'm sorry Cloud but you were taking too long" Rikku interrupted, Cloud just glared at her.

"Rikku, can I talk to Cloud alone?" Aeris asked.

Rikku ran off to stroke Sunstroke.

"I'm glad she's out of the way" Cloud muttered and Aeris laughed.

"I'm sorry about her" Aeris said apologetically.

"She's right though, I'm too nervous for my own good"

"I think that's cute though" she blushed.

"Would you … go out with me?" Cloud asked and reddened too.

She nodded "Yes" he sighed in relief.

"I'm glad you said that, I was scared you'd turn me down" he told her.

"At least I'd do so gently" she said with a smile "What's your chocobo's name?"

"Sunstroke, which fits cause of her feathers" he answered.

They couldn't talk much more because the bell rang, but there wasn't a rush because they were standing outside the window of their next class room, double magic, so they walked there, hand in hand.

Miss Trepe ordered everyone to show their homework, which was everyone except Lulu, and everyone managed to pass without detention.

For that lesson they were doing the theory of revival spells followed by practical practise, which was nasty, Sephiroth volunteered to kill people while others revived them. Miss Trepe only agreed because he wouldn't allow someone to kill him.

Cloud had dies no less than five times during that lesson and now his chest was aching as a result.

"That was fun!" Seph exclaimed as the crusaders took their, now, usual table.

"Easy for you to say, damn that sword is sharp" Shuyin complained.

Yuffie, Zell and Lenne arrived and sat down with their lunches.

"What's wrong with you guys, you look like you just came off the front lines" Zell said jokingly.

"We've been practising revival spells, for which we had to be dead" Tidus explained and then groaned.

"So who had the pleasure of killing you?" Lenne asked rubbing Shuyin's back sympathetically.

The older students pointed at Seph, who grinned.

"I swear; you're psychotic!" Cloud exclaimed and rested his head on the table.

"I'm sorry I can't do more for the pain" Aeris said "except this" and she kissed his cheek.

"Thank you" he said meekly and held her hand gently.

"Does this mean that you two are officially a couple?" Irvine asked and Aeris nodded "ALRIGHT! I've just won a bet, pay up!" he yelled at Squall, who handed him twenty five Gil.

Sephiroth slapped the table "Well I promised Cloud I'd do this, Tifa will you go out with me?" he said loudly.

She sat there for a moment thinking, or so the others thought, before she finally said "Yeah alright, you've got a nice ass" causing the table to erupt with laughter.

"Hey she's right" Selphie stated.

Irvine blinked in shock "What about mine!" he demanded.

She kissed him softly "Don't worry sweetie, yours is better, I was just stating a fact, he _has_ got a good one" she said loudly, much to Seph protests, something along the lines of 'clearly mine is the better ass'.

The afternoon went alright; first they had Mr Wallace teaching them soccer where Cloud was an excellent goalkeeper and Sephiroth was an ace striker and scored five goals.

Then they had history and Maechen actually remembered Cloud's name and didn't mess up the lesson once, but he did forget to give them homework. Not that anyone complained.

Then it was English and Mr Biggs went over the ending scene of Romeo and Juliet, which caused a few tears, even from some of the guys.

And finally there was Alchemy where Cid, which Cloud found out he was meant to call Mr Djose, had them mixing a winter storm and for homework they were to write up the effects of its use.

Throughout the entire afternoon Cloud sat next to Aeris and, since he was right handed and she was left, they held hands the entire time.

"So I'll see you guys at my place later?" he asked his friends who all nodded.

They didn't know if they'd be allowed to two sleepovers in one week, especially on such short notice, but they would definitely make his party.

"So, how about that lift home?" Aeris asked Cloud while linking arms with him.

He kissed her on the lips, bowed and said "Your chariot awaits milady."

Following her directions Cloud steered Sunstroke to her home, stopping at a supermarket so that Aeris could buy him a present, but she wouldn't tell him what it was until the party, she ran inside to ask her parents about Cloud's party and the sleepover, to which they said yes.

Cloud had decided to wait outside and keep an eye on Sunstroke, since there wasn't a paddock to keep her in.

With Aeris mentioning that Cloud was her boyfriend her parents decided that they wanted to meet him, but they understood about him caring about his chocobo and went outside to meet him.

Cloud was sitting on the grass with Sunstroke lying next to him, on her back, and he was rubbing her belly, she was having the time of her life and he tongue was lolling out of her beak.

"I take it you're Cloud" Aeris' father said in a business-like voice.

Cloud leapt to his feet and Sunstroke squawked her protest.

"Yes sir?" Cloud asked, being polite.

Aeris' father held out his hand which Cloud shook "My name is Echton; I'm Aeris' father, that's a fine chocobo you have their, seems a bit of a baby though" he said, slightly disapprovingly.

"Well everyone's got the right to be so, every once in a while, it's all part of being young at heart" Cloud answered, trying not to sound rude.

"Well I can agree with that" Echton's wife said "I'm Ifalna, by the way, Aeris' mother" Cloud shook hands with her too.

"Can I have your word that you'll not hurt my daughter Mr Strife? In any way?" Echton asked.

"You do sir; I'm not the hurtful type" Cloud answered.

Ifalna offered to allow Sunstroke into the back yard where they had some gyashi greens.

Cloud accepted and left Sunstroke happily eating, her reigns fastened to a nearby tree.

Aeris' house was beautiful on the inside, flowers sat in vases everywhere; it turned out that Aeris was quite the flower girl, because most of them were grown by Aeris herself, with a little of Iflana's help and guidance.

Aeris soon came downstairs with three bags, one held her homework; one had her pyjamas and a change of clothes in it and the last one held her swimming gear.

When Cloud asked about the swim gear her mother laughed.

"I see now what Aeris meant when she said you were rather inexperienced when it came to average teenage activities" she said, but not unkindly "You can't go to a pool party and not swim."

Comprehension dawned on Cloud's face, Aeris said goodbye to her parents, they loaded her bags on Sunstroke and started riding home.

**Well that's all from me … hands up all those who feel sorry for Cloud (for not realising that he actually had friends), please review, I'm still awaiting advice on Cloud's revenge.**


	7. Cloud's First Party

**Hi everyone, sorry I'm late (it's only 7 minutes) as always I own nothing, enjoy!**

Chapter 7 – Cloud's First Party

When they got home they found Rikku had led the others over and they all had permission to spend the night.

Jen had provided a barbeque for the food, Tiler had set up a small tent next to the large pool house and tol everyone that they were sleeping in there, Cloud and Sephiroth included.

"Uhhh, Dad? That tent's only big enough for two, maybe three people. How are we gonna all fit?" Cloud asked in total confusion.

"Follow me" Tiler told them, they did so and found a small mansion inside.

"What the …?" Paine cried.

"I've still got friends in ShinRa's research facility, they needed something to test this little gadget on so I offered my tent" Tiler explained while pointing to a tiny cube that was dangling from the roof of the tent.

"Cool!" Gippal exclaimed.

To top off the entertainment, Sephiroth had rented an automated DJ machine that has a karaoke option, he'd been told that Lenne had a terrific singing voice and was determined to hear it.

The pool house had a small changing room so Gippal, Shuyin, Zell and Cloud used them to change into their swim shorts while everyone else, minus Tidus and Wakka, used the rooms in the tent.

Now everyone was either in the pool or standing on the side and eating some food. All of the guys were wearing shorts, except Wakka and Tidus who always wore their ordinary clothes while swimming and the girls were all wearing bikinis, except for Lulu and Tifa, who could never fit their extremely large breasts into them, they were wearing one-piece swim suits.

Since Cloud was going to have his first ever Blitzball lesson, the guys were going to teach him the basics. It turned out that, like in soccer, Cloud fared best in goal, he was also able to hold his breath for a good five minutes, which was the average amount of time before a halftime.

Soon after they moved onto Marco Polo, Cloud went first for being blindfolded; he stood still for about a minute before he called out "Marco!"

"Polo" Tifa replied to his right, but he had a good sense of hearing and could tell that she was too far away to go for.

He took a few steps forward, the water now going up to his chest.

"Marco!" he called again.

"Polo" Tidus whispered in his ear, Cloud swiped at him, but wasn't fast enough.

"Marco?" Cloud asked.

"Polo" Aeris said from behind him, this time he caught someone and everyone started sniggering "Uhhh, Cloud? Would you kindly take your hands off my chest?"

"Oh, god I'm sorry!" Cloud apologised, he had no idea where his hands had gone, but nonetheless everyone else was laughing their heads off.

"You still haven't taken your hands away" Aeris whispered in his ear, her back against his chest "How do they feel" she asked, ignoring the others.

Cloud whipped his hands behind his back "I, uh, they felt great" he whispered back, blushing with embarrassment, she turned around, took his blindfold off and kissed him with her arms around his neck.

The others let out wolf whistles but Cloud and Aeris were in their own little world, Cloud had no idea what he was meant to do, but instinct told him to wrap his arms around Aeris' waist, which he did.

"Who's up for volleyball?" Rikku piped up.

"Not enough room for everyone" Seph answered.

Paine solved that problem by climbing onto Baralai's shoulders, everyone else took the hint and girls climbed onto the shoulders of their boyfriends, Rikku went with Gippal for two reasons, there weren't any other free guys and she was trying to get with Gippal anyway.

So now the teams were Aeris, riding Cloud; Lulu, riding Wakka; Rinoa, riding Squall; Lenne, riding Shuyin; and Rikku, riding Gippal. Against Tifa, riding Sephiroth, Yuna, who was on Tidus' shoulders, Yuffie, who was riding Zell, Selphie, on Irvine, and Paine, who was on Baralai.

That game ended after about half an hour when Wakka lost his balance and fell over, which Lulu jokingly blamed on her breasts, earning a round of laughs and applause.

They took a break to get some food and soft drinks, Tiler and Jen weren't allowing alcohol, and Seph passed a microphone to Lenne.

"I hear you've got a great voice, show me?" he asked.

She took a lot of convincing, but in the end Lenne decided to sing, she set up one of her favourite tracks and soon started.

_Waking up I see that everything is ok_

_The first time in my life and now it's so great! _

_Slowing down I look around and I am so amazed_

_I think about the little things that make life great_

_I wouldn't change a thing about it_

_This is the best feeling_

_This innocence is brilliant, I hope that it will stay_

_This moment is perfect, please don't go away, I need you now_

_And I'll hold on to it, don't you let it pass you by_

_I found a place so safe, not a single tear_

_The first time in my life and now it's so clear_

_Feel calm I belong, I'm so happy here_

_It's so strong and now I let myself be sincere_

_I wouldn't change a thing about it_

_This is the best feeling_

_This innocence is brilliant, I hope that it will stay_

_This moment is perfect, please don't go away, I need you now_

_And I'll hold on to it, don't you let it pass you by_

_It's the state of bliss you think you're dreaming_

_It's the happiness inside that you're feeling_

_It's so beautiful it makes you wanna cry_

_It's the state of bliss you think you're dreaming_

_It's the happiness inside that you're feeling_

_It's so beautiful it makes you wanna cry_

_It's so beautiful it makes you want to cry_

_This innocence is brilliant, it makes you want to cry_

_This innocence is brilliant, please don't go away_

_'Cause I need you now_

_And I'll hold on to it, don't you let it pass you by_

_This innocence is brilliant, I hope that it will stay_

_This moment is perfect, please don't go away, I need you now_

_And I'll hold on to it, don't you let it pass you by_

Sephiroth was gob-smacked "That … was beautiful, Shu never let this woman go, she's got the voice of a fallen angel".

"He's right there Lenne, where'd you learn to sing like that?" Cloud asked, equally stunned.

Lenne shrugged "Just came naturally I guess" she said.

"Now why didn't anybody tell me that there was one of these here?" Gippal yelled, holding a huge water rifle.

"Oh crap" Cloud yelled and dived into the water, pulling Aeris with him.

Gippal opened fire and sent everyone following Cloud, since the water in the rifle was ice cold.

Aeris surfaced for air and slapped Cloud's arm "WHAT WAS THAT FOR!" she demanded.

"That thing's got built-in coolers that water he's using is going to be freezing" he countered while rubbing his now red arm.

"Oh … sorry about your arm" she said and cuddled him, he sank until the water cam up to his neck and she sat on his knees, curling into him.

"Oh ain't that cute?" Gippal called while taking aim, but before he could fire, Wakka's Blitzball knocked the rifle out of his hand.

Tiler soon came in and picked up the weapon "Confiscated" he yelled and stormed out.

The evening carried on in great fun, the twins pulling off various pranks, from just shoving someone into the pool just after they finished drying themselves off, to snapping a photo of a kissing couple to setting off a tiny death charge just to make Tifa jump, resulting in her breasts flying out of her costume.

After Tifa had fixed her clothes and given up trying to kill the twins things simmered down, Lenne continued to sing through the night, occasionally joined by Yuna, who was quite good herself, and Cloud actually got around to learning to dance with Aeris too.

Overall it was the best birthday of Cloud's life, and he was actually disappointed that they had to call it off at half past ten because they had school the next day.

The crusaders got into the tent and went to separate rooms but, after Tiler left to go to bed himself, everyone shuffled around.

Cloud was just dosing off when he felt someone climb into bed next to him.

"Wuz goin on?" he asked sleepily.

"Whoops" Yuffie answered him "Wrong room" and she left quickly saying that she was sorry.

Feeling slightly confused, Cloud just shrugged and tried to go back to sleep, only to be interrupted again, this time by Aeris.

"Yuffie, Zell's room is next door" Cloud mumbled sleepily, causing Aeris to laugh and that made Cloud bolt upright "Sorry, I thought Yuffie got the wrong room … again. What're you doing here?"

She cuddled into him "I wanted to spend the night with you. I shared my bed with a guy once and ever since I've always hugged my pillow, but there aren't enough here … you don't mind, do you?" she asked, he shook his head and laid back down, cuddling her too.

They were about to dose off when they heard noises on the opposite side of both walls.

Cloud rolled his eyes at one wall, muttering something about Seph being his usual self.

"Sorry?" Aeris asked.

"That's Seph's room" Cloud explained pointing to the room to the right of the bed "It's typical of him on a first date to have that noise coming from his room!"

"You've never heard seen else having sex before … have you?" Aeris asked a hand rubbing his bare back, he usually slept topless, and he shook his head.

"No, is that what's going on in there?" he asked.

"I love that about you" she answered him.

"What?" he asked.

"You're innocence" she told him "I kinda know what goes on, I once walked in on my parents while they were …" she didn't need to finish her sentence, because Cloud visibly shuddered "I see you get the idea" she finished.

"Yeah, the same thing happened to me once, but my parents never made that much noise" he said.

"Different people make more noise than others" she explained as Yuffie screamed Zell's name from the room to their left "thanks Yuffie for proving my point" she added as Cloud laughed.

"You know, I wonder if this tent is soundproofed" Cloud thought aloud.

"Probably not, or we wouldn't have heard anything" Aeris answered as Tifa moaned 'I love you Sephiroth' to the right.

Looking at Seph's room Cloud asked "Does that mean it's over?"

Aeris smiled "For now at least, depends on how long Seph takes to get his energy back."

"EW!" Cloud yelled.

Laughing, Aeris kissed Cloud deeply and his hands slid into her hair, they laid down and fell asleep soon afterwards.

**Well that's all from me, please review and see you next week.**


	8. Blitzball

**Disclaimer: I own nothing to do with any Final Fantasy game or movie.**

**Hi everyone, I'm sorry that I've taken sooooooo long to update, I know I promised weekly updates, but I did something rather stupid, I needed space on my hard drive, so I cut and pasted all of my fanfictions onto a flash drive … and then lost the flash drive, but I've found it and now I'm back, enjoy.**

Chapter 8 – Blitzball

Tiler was less than impressed that people had changed rooms and his mood wasn't improved when he found that fourteen out of twenty of the tent's occupants were naked, the rest had just spent the night in each others arms.

But he still wasn't happy.

He yelled at everyone, except Cloud, this was the first time that Cloud had done something like that.

"Look Cloud, I'm happy that you've got a girlfriend, but try to tone it down a bit ok?" he said with a hoarse voice, having just yelled at everyone and threaten not to let them stop again.

"Sorry Dad, about the 'not letting my friends stop the night again'? Could you at least add 'in the same tent' to the end of that sentence?" Cloud asked making his father laugh and say he'd think about it.

Tiler was about to open Seph's room, when he shook his head "I already know what I'll see so I won't bother" he yelled.

Sephiroth wasn't pleased with that comment, he barged out of the door without considering putting some clothes on first "I'm insulted by that statement!" he shouted with his hands on his hips, then he looked down and realised that his nakedness was a complete contradiction to what he said and he just walked back into his room, slamming the door.

Cloud and Aeris got dressed quickly with their backs to each other, but Aeris kept sneaking quick glances at Cloud's backside.

Due to the fact that they were practically the last ones to be woken up, Cloud and Aeris found practically everyone else already at the table eating.

"So … who _didn't_ jump in the sack last night? Cloud asked devilishly.

Only Tidus, Yuna, Shuyin, Lenne, Aeris and Cloud himself raised his hands.

"So does that mean that you and Gippal are now officially together Rikku?" Tifa asked as she walked in adjusting her top.

Rikku didn't answer, she just kissed Gippal deeply.

"I'll take that as a 'yes', congrats you two" Seph said, shortly after which he got slapped by his mother "OW! What was that for?" he demanded.

"For setting a bad example for your brother and most likely keeping him awake last night" Jen yelled.

"How can you say I'm a bad example, he decided to keep his virginity last night, either that or he was too inexperienced to please Aeris" he countered, wiggling his eyebrows.

"I'll let you deal with them Jen, I'm off to work" Tiler said, heading for the paddock.

"What is your job sir?" Yuna asked.

"For the record, everyone except my sons can call me Tiler, and I train the local Police force in various scenarios, from bank robberies to hostage situations to riots" he explained, his sons said their goodbyes and he departed. In the distance they heard him yelling again "OH FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, I'VE JUST TOLD MY OWN KIDS OFF FOR THIS, NOW MY CHOCOBOS?"

"I just got an image of that" Yuffie stated "and it ain't pretty."

Ignoring this, they continued eating and getting ready for school, Jen told them to just take their completed homework with them and pick up their bags on the way home. She also told them not to take Tiler's words to heart, because he lost his virginity to her at the age of fourteen.

Because Cloud was giving her a lift home after school again today, Cloud loaded Aeris' bags onto Sunstroke anyway, she then remembered that she hadn't given Cloud his birthday present, it turned out to be the school's Blitzball uniform and it fit like a glove, by the time Cloud was ready to go, he and Aeris had been left behind.

"Well be late getting you home tonight, I'll have to get her checked by the vet, just to be safe" Cloud told Aeris as they set off.

"That's ok" she answered him with a kiss.

They caught up with the others soon enough and Cloud slowed Sunstroke down, just to be safe.

"Something wrong with your chocobo Cloud" Lulu asked.

"Just being safe instead of sorry, Dad told me I'm not to ride her if she's pregnant" he answered while keeping Sunstroke at a walking pace.

"I'll call my Dad and ask him to look her over, he specialises in chocobo breeding. He can tell you in about five minutes" Paine told him.

"Thanks Paine" Cloud said.

They got to school, Aeris hopped off Sunstroke with her homework and Cloud quickly ran her to the chorale, placing her saddle, reigns and Aeris' two extra bags in the lockers there.

He took out his time table to see where he was first and groaned, it was history, and thanks to his friends' activities last night, he was bound to fall asleep from a mixture of sleep deprivation and boredom.

Nevertheless he still ran to his locker, got his books for the morning and ran to class, just getting there in time for the bell.

Unfortunately as Cloud got into the class he ran head long into Ormi's butt, not a pretty sight.

"Well, well, well, look what we have here." Rufus drawled "Where's the fire Strife?"

"Well unlike you, I don't like being late for class" Cloud answered and tried to get past Ormi, which is hard enough when he stands still.

"Wait, just a second Strife. We just wanted to talk, now I know we got off on the wrong foot, but we of The Brotherhood would like to change that, you know start over" Seifer explained.

Fujin swiped a hand through the air and yelled "FRIENDS!"

"Don't worry about her, she does that ya know?" Raijin explained.

"Well, that's a lot to think about. Mind if I think it over, you understand I've not exactly had much reason to trust you recently" Cloud answered 'or ever' he thought to himself.

"Sure thing love" Leblanc answered, motioning to the others to take their seats.

Cloud took his seat next to Aeris and took her hand.

"What was that all about?" she asked.

"Seems 'The Brotherhood' wants to make nice with me, well I don't trust them" he whispered back, knowing full well that they were eves dropping.

The class went horribly Maechen couldn't remember anything; he even thought that he had the wrong class at one point. In the end he got so worked up over his confusion that he collapsed, much to the enjoyment of The Brotherhood.

Maechen was taken to hospital shortly afterward and Auron was covering his classes until a replacement arrived. It seemed that Maechen was going to be forcibly retired before Rufus' plan of inspections took flight.

Since Auron didn't have any lesson plans yet, he allowed Cloud's class to leave early. The Brotherhood asked Cloud again if he'd be 'friends' with them but he told them plainly.

"After the way you reacted to Maechen having a stroke, which is a minor heart attack, for those of you who don't understand what that means, I don't think so" and he walked away with Aeris to the English class where they met with the other crusaders, who were comforting Yuna and Lenne who were very fond of the oldest teacher at school, and were concerned for his life.

Mr Biggs' first class left and he was surprised to see the crusaders waiting to go in; then he saw that Yuna and Lenne were crying.

"Oh dear, what's wrong girls?" he asked.

"It's Mr Maechen, he had a stroke in our class" Rikku explained, trying her best not to cry too.

"What? Come on in" he told them, they took their seats and explained everything.

He did have something different planned but for that lesson he simply tried to cheer everyone up by having them act out various parts from an old television comedy show called M*A*S*H.

By the end of the lesson everyone was feeling slightly better, still worried about Maechen, but at least, in Yuna and Lenne's case, no longer in tears.

Break was a rather sombre time for the crusaders that day; Rikku had brought some left over buns and muffins from Cloud's party and passed them around. That resulted in Rikku, Yuffie and Zell being cheered up due to sugar rushes.

And then Cloud had his first real experience of Blitzball.

They had to wear uniforms in this lesson, and Mr Wallace decided to run Cloud and Seph through all of the positions.

First was goalkeeper, where Cloud fared better than Seph and out of five penalty shots each, Cloud saved all five and Seph only saved one.

After that they were allowed a one minute break to grab some air; Cloud could've stayed underwater, but welcomed the air anyway.

Next they tried defender. They each had Wakka or Tidus try to get past with nobody in the goal. Out of five attempts each, five goals were scored. Obviously, defender wasn't their strong suits.

After another minute break, they tried midfielder, where they had to get past an opposing midfielder and two strikers, then pass to their team's striker at the other end of the pool, without them fumbling the ball, they both managed to get past the attacks, but only Cloud managed to pass the ball successfully.

Another break and finally they had striker, their job was to get past two defenders and score, they had five attempts each, Cloud never scored and Seph had a perfect score.

"Well it seems that Cloud's best in goal and Sephiroth's a striker" Mr Wallace pointed out "how long can you two hold your breath for?"

Cloud told him that he could hold his for an average of five minutes, and Seph said about four, if he forced himself.

So far a quarter of the lesson had gone by, The Brother hood were obviously not attending the lesson and so for the second quarter he had everybody helping Cloud and Seph with breathing exercises to help them get to an average of at least seven minutes.

It worked, for the most part, Cloud could now last about eight minutes and Sephiroth could last six, before either of them started to turn blue.

So for the second half of the lesson Barret decided to give Cloud and Seph a taste of a live match.

There were six members to a team, two strikers, one midfielder, two defenders and one goalkeeper.

Cloud was the goalkeeper for his team, Paine and Yuna were his defenders, Selphie was the midfielder and Tidus and Gippal were the strikers.

The other team consisted of Rikku as their goalkeeper, Tifa and Aeris as the defenders, Squall as the midfielder and Wakka and Sephiroth as the strikers.

It was the most violent thing Cloud had ever seen, well for a sport at least. The ball was released and the midfielders had to race for it, Squall caught it and Selphie shot forward, kicked him in the gut, then back-flipped, kicking him in the face, and stole the ball.

Wakka and Sephiroth then moved to tackle her and she passed to Tidus before they got to her, he caught it and swam for the opposite goal.

He didn't get far, Wakka, Squall and Tifa cornered him, Tifa went to kick him, he dodged, but swam, face first, right into Wakka's fist and finally took a kick to his stomach, from Squall, and lost the ball.

By this time Sephiroth had swum towards Cloud's goal, Squall had the ball and made a long pass to Seph, who caught it and got tackled by Paine. She had swum right into his midriff and Yuna waited for Sephiroth to do something.

He took aim, which was difficult with Paine trying to prise the ball from his hands, and shot, Yuna tried to get a hand to it, but just missed, Cloud sat there and watched, analysing where the ball was going, then he dived for it and caught it effortlessly.

He looked around, saw Gippal was open and hurled the ball at him; he caught it and charged for the opposite end of the pool.

Aeris and Squall went for him, but he made a short pass to Tidus before they got to him.

Tidus made easy work of dodging Tifa and shot, Rikku dived for the ball, but missed, Cloud did a back flip in celebration, they were winning one nil.

Everyone went back to their starting positions and a new ball was released, Squall caught it first again and this time passed it to Wakka fast, who volleyed it at Cloud's goal, he caught it again, but strangely this time it made him feel slightly off.

He only made a short pass to Yuna this time, which was when Mr Wallace called a time out, then decided that it might as well be half time since there was only a few seconds left.

"What's wrong Cloud?" he asked once Cloud got out of the pool, last.

Cloud never answered him; he just keeled over and vomited.

"Right, that answers my question, now, who used a venom technique?" Barret demanded.

Wakka raised his hand "That might have been me ya?" he said apologetically.

"Well, well done for mastering the technique, but using it on a rookie goalkeeper wasn't exactly using ya brain, was it?" Barret asked.

"Well I didn't expect him to actually catch a venom shot, ya" Wakka countered, Barret just smiled.

"Seems we shouldn't underestimate you Blondie" Barret said, helping Cloud to his feet "Yuna, we'll need an antidote if you've got one, or have you mastered the Esuna spell?" he asked.

Yuna stepped forward and placed her hands on Cloud and he was feeling fine again.

"Thanks" Cloud said, no longer looking green.

"You're welcome" Yuna answered with a smile.

Mr Wallace called an end to the match and decided to go over all of the different ways that a player could be disadvantaged, like poisoned or put to sleep, and the various techniques that could cause these. When Cloud asked how a goalkeeper could use any, Mr Wallace explained the super goalie technique, what would give him a better chance of saving a shot, not that Cloud seemed to need it.

Soon after Barret finished his lecture he set them some homework, to start practising a 'status technique' by their next Blitzball lesson, to show him, in the case of goalkeepers, either the super goalie, grip gloves or golden arm techniques.

Lunch was fun, everyone was either congratulating Wakka on mastering the Venom Shot or giving Cloud pats on the shoulder for throwing up or saying he was turning green again.

The afternoon went by swiftly, in magic class they made a start on time magic, and their homework was a list of spells and their effects by the next lesson.

Combat was relatively exciting, Kimahri actually brought in fiends to practise on, Cloud and Sephiroth decided to team up on a huge dragon and took it down in under a minute, afterwards everyone, in groups of three, tried to beat their time but, most of them, ended up needing to be revived by the broken-horned Ronso.

Then they had alchemy. Cid knew what had happened to Maechen and tried to take their minds off it by having them mix ten ingredients of their choice and write down what they used and what happened after adding each item. Most of the results were 'interesting' to say the least, but fun nonetheless, especially when Sephiroth's mixture blew up in his face with the sixth ingredient, he simply wrote down 'ingredient 6 – BOOM!' and stopped mixing, for his own safety.

After that they had double maths, where they made a start on algebra. Cloud struggled to get his head around it, but once he figured it out even managed to help Wakka stay awake by explaining it to him.

Their homework was a bunch of questions with complicated algebraic equations, to be handed in the next day, which left Wakka worried and begging Cloud to allow him over that night for help.

Cloud simply left it in the hands of his brother and took Aeris to the chocobo chorale, saddled Sunstroke up and followed Paine's directions to her father's veterinary service.

**And that's all from me, I promise that I'll see you again next week.**


	9. Is Sunstroke Pregnant

**Disclaimer: I don't own any of the Final Fantasy games.**

**Hi everyone, here's chapter nine, hope you all enjoy it. (Sorry for the crap intro, I couldn't think of anything)**

Chapter 9 – Is Sunstroke Pregnant?

It didn't take long for Cloud and Aeris to get to get to Paine's father's veterinary practise.

Aeris agreed to wait outside with Sunstroke while Cloud ran inside to fetch Paine's  
Dad.

"Ah you must be Cloud, Paine informed me that you be coming around." He said, motioning for Cloud to lead the way to his pet "Hello, you much be Sunstroke" he said, giving he a gentle scratch on her feathers "I'm Dr Berm and now let's see what's going on, shall we?"

He proceeded to check various points on Sunstroke's body, much to her displeasure; he also took a urine sample, at which point Cloud decided he was not going into any form of medicine, and a blood sample, which made Sunstroke squawk in pain.

Dr Berm left and came back five minutes later.

"Well Mr Strife, I can quite easily confirm that your chocobo is _not_ pregnant, you should find her perfectly fit to ride" he explained.

With that knowledge Cloud and Aeris rode back to her house, Cloud tethered Sunstroke to a tree again so that he could help his girlfriend, 'Hehe, I like saying that' he thought to himself, unpack her things.

He was just about to leave when she stopped him.

"I love you" she said with a soft hiss.

She was about to pull away when Cloud decided to be bold and deepen the kiss, quickly tracing her lips with his tongue and she parted them, Cloud and Aeris stood there at the door, their tongues doing a graceful dance.

They only pulled apart when Aeris' mother cleared her throat loudly.

"I love you too Aeris" Cloud told her "would it be alright for me to pick her up tomorrow and take her to school Mrs … what _is_ your last name?" he asked.

Ifalna laughed "It's Gainsborough, but please, when my husband isn't around, just call me Ifalna" she said "and yes, it would be fine, see you tomorrow morning."

Cloud smiled and hugged Aeris, giving her another quick kiss and taking his leave.

He found it difficult to get anywhere however, mainly because he and Aeris couldn't stop blowing kisses to each other.

Eventually though Aeris' father came home and jokingly told Cloud to go home before his parents were called and asked to drag him away.

Cloud got home within two minutes and quickly asked his father is he could use the family computer for his homework, he had to write up a piece of creative writing on computer, since Seph had done his already and printed it off, Cloud was permitted.

He was a fast typist and within five minutes, Cloud had written five pages from his rough notes, the phone rang while he was writing his sixth page.

"Cloud, it's for you" Jen said, passing the phone to him.

"Hello?" Cloud said, holding the phone in between his ear and shoulder.

"Hi Cloud, it's Aeris, have you finished your homework yet?" she asked.

"Hold that thought" Cloud answered, a quick flurry of typing and "there, done, what's up Aeris?" he asked, giving her his full attention.

"I was wondering if you had instant messenger on your computer" she told him.

"I don't think so" he said "hang on, DAD" he called.

Tiler ran up to him "What's the problem?" he demanded.

"Do we have instant messenger on here?" Cloud asked Tiler shook his head.

"No, and I'd prefer that it didn't go on here either, this is my computer and I don't really want you and Sephiroth using it for anything except homework. But I'll see about you two getting your own laptops for homework and personal use, ok?"

"Thanks Dad" Cloud said "It'd probably be a good idea if you got off the phone before your parents complain about the bill" they exchanged 'I love you's and hung up.

Cloud asked where his brother was, and wasn't too surprised to find that he was in the pool, doing laps.

He went to the edge of the pool and just stood there, staring at the rippling water.

Seph finished another lap and, noticing that Cloud was there, decided to take a break.

"What's up Cloud?" he asked.

"Just thinking" he answered "have you ever been in love with someone? And I don't just mean their body, or one part of it."

"I honestly don't think so, but I did once date a college student that was studying psychology, she explained it to me" he told his brother.

"What did she say about it?" Cloud asked.

"Well, I know where this is going, okay, tell me your symptoms cause trust me, what you've got is a serious illness" Seph informed him.

"Well, she's on my mind constantly, holding her hand is like a lifeline, just _looking_ at her makes me feel … I dunno fulfilled … do you think I'm in love?" Cloud asked after finishing his rambling.

"Maybe. I've never felt any of that myself, but you never know, maybe I will … one day" Seph answered "But I'm fairly certain that you are … and I envy you. If you're lucky enough you'll have found 'the one' on your first outing in the world of love"

Cloud chuckled "Fancy getting in some practise" he asked, clearly meaning Blitzball.

"Yeah, sure" Seph answered, Cloud ran off to get his uniform and when he got back he jumped in.

They started off simple, Sephiroth shooting and Cloud catching, Cloud seemed to be a better catch than Seph was a shot, but they never got into an argument. Seph just looked at it as 'hey I'm a better swordsman, he's a better Blitzer, it just balances things out'.

Then they started their homework, practising a special move, Cloud decided to practise Grip Gloves while Seph practised a Wither Shot.

By the time they were called in for bed, since they still had school the next morning, Cloud had halved the amount of times he dropped the ball and Seph had actually managed to affect Cloud's throw.

The next morning Cloud was woken by the sound of someone moaning.

"_Oh Aeris, mmm, you are sooo good"_ was playing out of a tape recorder, over and over again, at full blast next to Cloud's ear. It didn't take him long to realise that it was his voice, Seph and his mother standing in the doorway laughing their heads off kinda gave it away, Cloud just grabbed one of his pillows and hurled it at his brother.

All Seph did was wriggle another tape recorder between two of his fingers "Oh just wait until Aeris hears _this_!" he called triumphantly.

Cloud shot out of bed and charged at his brother, but his mother held him back.

"Now Cloud, calm down, Sephiroth, give me that tape" she said, Seph handed it over, he could never disobey her "thank you, now please get ready for school!" it was a command, not a request.

They scampered downstairs, tripping over each other's feet and falling most of the way, they were fine, and got their food.

Cloud was ready fairly fast and, after telling his mother that he'd agreed to give Aeris a ride to school "Which reminds me, Sunstroke's not pregnant", left.

"Not that I'm much of a judge on this subject Mum, but I think the kid's in love" Sephiroth said with a casual shrug.

"Well _I_ am, and I agree he is in love, the real question is, is Aeris" Jen answered.

"Well by my knowledge, probably not, they spent an entire night in the same bed together and _didn't_ have sex? She don't love him" that earned him a cuff on the head.

"Didn't you consider that maybe your brother didn't ask, or that love isn't just about sex? Okay granted, sex can be a bonus to love, but for most people, you excluded obviously, love is deeper than that" Jen scolded her oldest.

"Maybe I will too" he countered with a raised eyebrow "it could simply be the fact that I haven't matured yet, okay I know that's insulting myself, but that's not my point!"

"Hmmm, possibly" Jen answered, then, noticing the time, decided to hurry Sephiroth up.

On his way out the door Sephiroth turned back to his mother "Am I alright to bring Tifa back after school?" he asked.

"What about Rikku? In fact never mind, bring both of them, I don't often get 'girl talk' around here, and ask Cloud to bring Aeris too." She was about to let him go when she thought about something "Oh and Sephiroth" he poked his head back through the door "no sex!" he just laughed and nodded.

"Alright mother, love you!" he said.

She hurried forward and held him tight, he was slightly taller than her, and still growing, not that she minded "I love you too sweetheart, tell Cloud I said the same" she said, and lightly pushed him out the door, before he ended up being late.

Seph looked at his watch and broke into a run; he didn't want to miss Tifa.

Cloud knocked on the front door at the Gainsborough house, he father answered.

"Morning Mr Gainsborough" Cloud said cheerfully "Has Aeris left yet?"

"No she hasn't Cloud, she's still getting ready, come inside and have yourself some coffee" he said, holding the door open for him, Cloud accepted the invitation to enter, but not the coffee, he couldn't stand the stuff.

"Have you ever tried mint tea Cloud?" Ifalna asked.

"No I don't think so, but I do love mints" he answered.

Ifalna smiled warmly and poured Cloud a cup, she didn't add milk, but she did add three sugar cubes "Try this" he did so, it was warm and delicious.

"Wow" was all he could say after he swallowed it "normally I have my tea with milk and no sugar, but that was fantastic!" he exclaimed.

"Well apparently your not supposed to add milk to a tea infusion, which I learned much to my own embarrassment, and the more sugar you add to one, the more you can taste the flavour, but I wouldn't recommend any more than three" Echton stated.

"Oh, morning Cloud I didn't expect you so early" Aeris said as she came downstairs.

"Oh … I'll wait outside then" Cloud said, feigning hurt in his voice.

"I said I didn't expect you so early" Aeris said quickly, grabbing his arm and kissing his cheek "but I'm glad to see you anyway" she stood on her tiptoes and leaned towards his ear "I love you" she whispered and lowered herself to her normal height.

Cloud finished his tea, thanked Aeris' parents for the drink and they left for school.

"I think she might be in love again Echton" Ifalna said, leaning on her husband's shoulder, after watching them ride away.

"I think so too dear, but this guy is different from Zak, that _boy_ was always so cocky and thought he could get away with anything, this young man is quite polite. I never liked Zak, and I told Aeris as much, but I do like Cloud, he seems more deserving of her" he looked into his wife's eyes "and I'm rambling again, aren't I?"

She stood on her toes and kissed his nose "Only a little" she said "Come on, you're going to be late for work!"

Back on Sunstroke, Cloud was telling Aeris about his conversation with Sephiroth last night.

"Well a guy like Seph _would_ think that love's an illness, but I know better. If you can name at least ten things about your girlfriend that you love then the relationship can at least work, my last boyfriend, and only for that matter, struggled to name three and overall we only lasted about a month" Aeris explained, and she made more sense than Seph did "well come on!"

"Oh … you want me to name ten things I love about you" Cloud exclaimed, realisation flashing across his face "well, I love your smile, it always brightens my day, I love your eyes, I could stare into them for all eternity, I love how smart you are, I love the fact that you'd help anyone with their problems, I love the way you dance, you taught me, I love how good a teacher you are, and how good a teacher you would probably make, I love how you hate violence, even when it's for the right reasons, I love your voice, it's the most soothing thing I've ever heard and you could probably be able to give Lenne a run for the title of top singer, I love how much we have in common, our love of chocobos for example, I love the fact that when I first met you, you were willing to wait for me to finish speaking instead of saying something like 'can we hurry this up I've got places to be', I love the fact that you love me and …" she covered his mouth with her hands.

"Ok that's enough, you already said eleven" she told him with a quiet giggle.

"Oh, sorry" he turned slightly in the saddle, they had stopped at a red light "I love you" he said and kissed her deeply.

She just kissed back, not caring that Rikku and Gippal were walking past and had started wolf whistling.

It wasn't until the car behind Sunstroke beeped at them, causing her to jump and glare at the driver behind her, that they pulled apart and noticed the light had turned green.

Cloud walked Sunstroke to the chorale once he and Aeris had gotten to school; he was surprised to find another chocobo in there, but didn't dwell on that train of thought.

The first lesson of the day was magic, Quistis was teaching draining magic today, throughout the lesson people were practising either draining health from their practise partner or draining their mana, to Cloud the idea of draining mana seemed pointless, it just made both combatants lose mana, the caster in using the spell and the victim in having it drained, it wasn't until Miss Trepe explained that an opponent losing their mana faster could easily turn the tide of battle, especially if Cloud was battling a mage.

Second they had Alchemy with Rikku's Dad; today they were mixing elixirs to test at the end of the lesson.

The crusaders managed to create their elixirs perfectly, and they worked just as well, but strangely enough every member of The Brotherhood had been poisoned by their mixtures.

Cid just gave them antidotes and then detention for not following the instructions.

The whole time Tidus and Shuyin were shaking with laughter, the crusaders didn't need to ask, they had both asked to go to the bathroom at the same time and The Brotherhood started yelling something about coming out of the closet at last, this was obviously their revenge. The twins did know how to get into the vents; they probably added something to the mixtures.

Then there was break, where Lenne, Yuffie and Zell were filled in on the little mishap of alchemy class and the younger crusaders informed the older crowd about Dona's antics in their class.

Dona was in Lenne's, Yuffie's and Zell's class and Barthello was in the class that Cloud and Rikku started the year in and apparently both were causing trouble for the other students in the class.

The bell went and the group broke up, Wakka groaned when he looked at their timetable to see what they had, double maths.

In that class, first things first, Mr Wedge collected homework and was surprised to see that Wakka had gotten his answers right.

"Miracles will _never_ cease!" he'd exclaimed and gave Wakka top marks.

Then he went onto quadratic equations.

"For those of you that watch Red Dwarf, these are _not_ as hard as Mr Rimmer thinks, they're actually quite easy once you've tried a few" and for the most part he was right, Cloud had done only two of them before he understood how they worked, Aeris had done three and between them they explained it to Wakka.

During lunch Wakka complained about his head hurting from too much maths, he ate his lunch quickly, and then proceeded to fall asleep in his tray.

"Don't worry about him, he's always like that after double maths" Lulu explained to Cloud, Paine simply scowled at him and smirked, something that only she could do.

After lunch they were supposed to have history, but Auron hadn't replaced Maechen yet, it was confirmed that he wasn't coming back, and since he hadn't managed to create a lesson plan, he used to be a combat teacher, so he was a little out of his field.

Instead of teaching history, Auron allowed them to use the session for homework.

After that they had Mr Wallace for basketball, he always used Fridays for going over technique, such as shooting technique, Cloud had a fair aim, but could never actually get the ball to drop into the basket, so Barret showed him how.

By the end of the lesson, Cloud was able to actually score, while standing still. To finish things off, they had a fun game of boys vs. girls, the girls won, by three points; Seph put it down to them being more agile.

Then they had combat class, Kimahri had again brought fiends into class and this time they were to fight defensively, they had to stay conscious and wait for the fiend to ware itself out, before killing it, it was very challenging, especially when they found out that if you needed healing, you were out.

They left that lesson, slightly battered and bruised, but otherwise fine, it was a valuable battle tactic to learn; sometimes you just had to defend yourself until your opponent wore themselves down enough for you to attack.

Finally they had double English, where, apparently 'as per usual', they were put into pares and given a piece of a Shakespeare play to learn, and within five minutes they were to perform that piece and the class would give the performers points out of ten, the team with the highest score got to go home without any homework.

The part they had to do were from Romeo and Juliet, it was the scene where Romeo climbed onto Juliet's balcony.

By the end of the lesson Sephiroth and Tifa had gotten away with no homework, without a doubt Seph's "ARISE FAIR JULIET AND CRUSH THE ENVIOUS MOON! … Here you can borrow my sword" had won it for them; theirs had been the most comical and gotten them a standing ovation.

"Romeo, Romeo where for art thou Romeo … come on I've been waiting five minutes already" Rikku repeated Tifa's words, that was the first joke they had put in, Mt Biggs was shocked at first, but once he realised what they were doing, he just laughed along with the class.

"Ah the weekend" Zell said with a stretch at the main entrance "nothing can beat it!"

"Can't deny that, Cloud, Seph have you two had a look around the island yet?" Rikku asked.

They both shook their heads.

"Well that can wait until tomorrow, tonight I'm taking Seph to the movies" Tifa announced.

"Our first date?" Seph asked a hand on Tifa's waist.

"I was planning on taking Cloud to the movies!" Aeris pouted.

"How about a double date?" Cloud suggested.

"That should never happen on a first date Cloud" all the girls said at the same time, which was eerie.

"Well, I could always take you to dinner or maybe a different movie" Cloud suggested.

Aeris kissed his cheek "Sounds like a plan to me" she said.

They all broke up then, arranging to meet at the beach at eleven am tomorrow to show Cloud and Sephiroth around all their haunts.

"Cloud, before you run off, Mum asked me to ask you to ask Aeris to come over tonight" Seph yelled to them as they were heading to the chocobo chorale.

"Ok!" Cloud and Aeris shouted back.

They got to the chorale and that other chocobo was still there, Cloud could tell, from the way that Sunstroke was acting, that it was another female, she was midnight blue with white patches over her eyes.

Aeris ran up to her and gave her a scratch of welcome.

"Excuse me, but would you kindly leave my chocobo alone" a tall brunette woman in a pale blue dressed asked, but was silenced by the soft cooing of her chocobo "strange, she normally doesn't like strangers, my apologies, I thought you would bother her."

"No worries" Cloud answered, saddling up Sunstroke and climbing aboard "what's your chocobos name?"

"Nightshade, yours?" the woman answered.

"Sunstroke" Cloud told her, offering a hand to Aeris.

"Hmmm, fits I suppose" she said, saddling her own bird and admiring Sunstroke's colouring at the same time "at first I thought she'd spent too much time in the sun, it must be natural."

"Yeah, well, see you around!" Cloud waved and rode away.

"Yes, I have no doubt you shall" she murmured, watching them leave "on Monday."

**So who's the mysterious woman? Why will Cloud and Aeris see her on Monday? Find out … in later chapters.**


	10. First Date

**I own nothing, YOU HEAR ME, NOTHING … not even my sanity, I sold it for all it was worth … 25 pence.**

**Hi everyone, another week gone, another chapter here, enjoy.**

Chapter 10 – First Date

Cloud rode Aeris home; they talked about the woman who owned Nightshade, wondering who she was.

However, talking to her had made them slightly late, because Echton had gotten home at the same time as they did.

"You're late, well late for riding a chocobo" he said, getting out of his car.

"Yeah, we had a little chat with someone at the chorale, another chocobo owner" Aeris explained.

"Well let's get something to eat, coming Cloud?" he asked making his way inside.

"Daddy … Cloud was going to take me out for dinner tonight" Aeris said, looking at the floor.

"Oh, I'll let your mother know, you best get ready. I suppose I'll be seeing you later Cloud?" Echton asked.

Cloud nodded "Yessir!" he said, saluting.

"Just get going" Echton said with a chuckle and Cloud left.

Once Cloud got home he found the rest of his family already eating.

"I told Mum that you were eating out with Aeris tonight so she served dinner without you" Seph explained, Cloud nodded and asked if he could be excused.

"Of course dear … Cloud, why are you shaking?" Jen asked.

"I haven't the slightest idea" he answered, visibly trembling.

Having already finished his food, Seph got up and strode to his little brother.

"It's quite simple Cloud, you're getting worries about your first date, come on, I'll help you out" he said leading Cloud up to his room, where he started looking through his clothes and threw a towel in Cloud's face "go have a shower!"

Cloud did as he was told; the hot water actually calmed him down slightly. When he was done he walked back into his room, all the bedrooms had an adjoining bathroom, and found that Seph had laid out several of his clothes on the bed.

"Right, I've just finished with both Tifa and Aeris, Seph's sorting himself and I'm here to help you out" said Rikku, loudly.

"Whoa, Rikku I'm in a TOWEL HERE!" Cloud yelled.

"Oh please, the amount of times my brother and old man decided to walk into the room butt naked, don't worry I'll not take the towel off" she said calmingly.

She proceeded to hold different shirts up to Cloud's chest, then at the same time hold a pair of jeans or dress pants up, just to see if they mixed, in the space of five minutes she'd picked out a red button-up shirt and told him to keep the top three buttons undone and to go with it a pair of Sephiroth's black jeans which he had 'donated for the cause'.

Finally she handed Cloud his razor "Now get a shave and try not to cut yourself, I'll check Sephiroth" and she left.

Cloud quickly shaved his face, surprised by how much stubble had appeared on his face in only a week.

He left the bathroom and got dressed, just in time for Seph to charge in, wearing a bright green, short sleeved, shirt and sky blue jeans. He slammed the door shut and leaned against it.

"Save me" he whimpered and, soon, it was clear why.

Rikku started thumping the door "SEPHIROTH THAT OUTFIT IS RIDICULUS!" she yelled through the door.

"She's got a point there mate" Cloud pointed out "maybe if you went with this" he held up a dark blue shirt with a black dragon pattern all over it, Seph quickly changed shirts just as Rikku burst in.

She was about to forcibly change Seph's shirt when she paused, tilted her head from one side to the other and nodded her head "That's perfect!" she exclaimed, jumping up and down while clapping her hands rapidly.

Shortly after giving Cloud directions from Aeris' house to a fantastic pizza parlour, Rikku went home.

Jen and Tiler wished both their sons good luck and told them to be back by midnight, which gave them seven hours.

Seph was glad that he and Tifa had eaten before leaving home, since he had to walk, Rikku had given him directions to Tifa's house. When he got there he found Tifa waiting in her doorway.

"Hi there handsome, Cloud and Aeris left five minutes ago, so I knew that you were coming" Tifa called when she saw him.

"I see, have you decided on something to watch or are we picking something when we get there?" Seph asked.

"When we get there I think, that way we both know what's on" she answered.

Seph smiled and, linking arms, started walking her to the cinema, following her directions.

Along the way they talked about Blitzball, his and Cloud's lives before moving to Besaid, Midgar, how Sephiroth had been suspended for fighting in the corridors when he was just defending Cloud and then Seph asked about Tifa's past and the crusaders.

Tifa told him how the group got together, it started small, they were just in the same year, but then, when they were all around twelve, Leblanc, Ormi and Logos had tried to beat up this ten year old, Besaid High was a Junior and Senior high school, Tidus had yelled at them to stop and they tried to beat him up instead.

Shuyin stepped in to help his brother and, to this day nobody knew why, Wakka, Lulu, Paine, Baralai, Gippal, Rikku (who was the ten year old), Yuna, Squall, Rinoa, Selphie, Irvine, Aeris and Tifa just jumped in to help. Leblanc and her cronies just ran for it and the crusaders had been friends ever since.

They got to the cinema, not having realised how fast they were moving, they saw Cloud and Aeris in the pizza parlour and waved to them.

They got to the cinema and Seph was surprised to see all the films being shown as posters on the outside, in Midgar you had to go inside to find out what was on.

"Hey, let's watch Taken, the trailer looked awesome" Tifa cried.

"What's it about?" Seph asked.

"This guy let's his daughter go on a trip to another country with just her best friend and get's kidnapped, while she's on the phone to her Dad, he talks to the kidnapper and tells him 'I don't know who you are, if you're looking for ransom, I can tell you that I don't have money, but what I do have are a particular set of skills, skills that I have acquired over a very long carrier, skills that make me a nightmare for people like you. If you let my daughter go now, that'll be the end of it, but if you don't I will look for you, I _will_ find you. And I will kill you' and the kidnapper says 'good luck' and hangs up" she explained.

"Well I'm hooked, let's go!" Seph yelled and they ran in, Tifa bought the tickets and Seph bought the 'munchies' as Tifa put it; in other words, he bought the sweets and drinks.

Back in the pizza parlour Cloud and Aeris were just being given their double cheese and pepperoni pizza, they had argued slightly, but Aeris had beaten him down to an agreement, he was paying for the meal and she was paying for them to get into the cinema afterwards, they were both paying for their own sweets and drinks.

"And what will you have to drink" the waitress asked, Aeris ordered a blackcurrant and lemonade and Cloud ordered a coke with lemon and lime.

They sat their, slowly eating their pizza, just talking about their pasts **(A/N exactly the same that Seph and Tifa talked about, but from different points of view)**, but Cloud was getting confused.

"Aeris? Is this normal for a first date?" he asked.

"What do you mean?" she asked, leaning on the back of her crossed fingers.

"I mean, for a first date … is it normal to just talk about the past?" he elaborated.

"Oh, that, yes normally you spend a first date getting to know each other, pasts, hopes for the future, hobbies, interests and other stuff like that" she explained.

"Don't we normally do that when we hang out?" Cloud asked.

"Yes, but on a first date it's different, for one thing we can tell each other things that we wouldn't tell anyone else about our pasts, and for another" she leaned across the table and kissed him quickly "if we did _that_ while hanging out with everyone else we'd either get wolf whistles, cat calls or told to get a room" she explained.

"So the first date is kinda like hanging out, with some fringe benefits?" Cloud asked and Aeris laughed.

"Yes, kinda like that" she answered.

"So what happens on the second date?"

"I dunno, Zak and I never really got to a second date, after the first he would just pull me into quiet corners and force a make-out session onto me" Aeris said, she explained how sometimes, even in a crowded room, her ex-boyfriend would try and put his hands up her shirt.

"So … after tonight … we're both in unfamiliar territory" Cloud sighed with both worry, and defeat.

They carried on talking, mainly about what they wanted to do the next day, when Aeris remembered that she didn't have a change of clothes for the next day; she quickly called her parents, while Cloud called his. She asked her mother to get some clothes together, Cloud stating that she could bring her swimming things if she wanted, and Cloud asked his father to go to Aeris' and pick it up, giving him directions.

With that little crisis dealt with, they started laughing, finished their meal, Cloud paying for it of course, and walked across the road to the cinema.

"So, what's on?" Cloud asked, looking at the posters, Aeris had warned him in advance about the posters on the outside of the building.

"Well, there's Taken, Quantum of Solace, The House Bunny, City of Ember, Burn After Reading, Eagle Eye, Ghost Town and Mirrors" Aeris stated, making her way down the line of posters.

"What do you wanna watch?" Cloud asked.

"I'd like to watch Ghost Town" she said and they went in, she paid for their tickets, they had ten minutes until the film started, Aeris went to get herself some popcorn while Cloud called his parents to both check that her things had arrived, and to tell them that their movie wouldn't finish until about five minutes to midnight, so they would most likely be late home.

Tiler and Jen weren't happy about it, but they agreed to let them under the condition that, as soon as they got out of their film, they'd call home and stay on the line until they got home.

Cloud agreed and hung up, switching off his mobile in the process.

"Your turn" Aeris said cheerfully.

"Okay, my parents know that we're going to be late home, can you call them as soon as we get out and stay on the line till we get back?" he asked, she nodded and he went to get a pack of skittles, a pack of chocolate Maltesers and a large lemonade for them to share.

By the time he finished paying it was time to go in, he met up with Aeris and she turned off her phone.

Inside they saw a trailer for Saw V, Aeris told him that the first one was good, but they just kept repeating the same story, so they lost their appeal. They also saw an advert for Mirrors, which Cloud swore there and then that he would never watch, the trailer alone made him iffy about looking in a mirror ever again. Then there was James Bond 007: Quantum Of Solace, which, Cloud thought, looked absolutely awesome, Aeris told him she'd ask her father if he'd lend Cloud his James Bond collection. And, just before the film started, they saw a trailer for Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa, having seen the first one, they were both highly interested.

The best part of two hours later Cloud and Aeris came outside, Aeris chatting to Jen excitedly. Cloud's mother wasn't the type to go to the movies but she did like hearing about a good movie, it gave her a good reason to either buy it or not when it entered the shops.

They walked over to the chocobo chorale, yes there was one at the local nightlife park, and found, unsurprisingly, Sunstroke asleep.

"Awe she looks cute when she's asleep" Aeris said putting Jen on speaker.

"_What are you on about?"_ Jen asked.

"Sunstroke, she fell asleep" Cloud said, he tried to wake her up, and failed. So he tickled her, it didn't take long for her to bolt upwards, groggy, but awake. "Ready to go home girl?"

She cooed quietly and allowed him to climb on, Cloud helped Aeris on and she sat in front with Cloud's arms on either side of her, since she had to hold her mobile all the time, it wasn't safe for her to try and sit behind.

If they were wide awake the trip home would've only taken about five minutes, and Cloud and Aeris would've gotten home on time, but Cloud was getting drowsy, Aeris was actually starting to nod off and Sunstroke was weaving from left to right, no matter how much Cloud tried to keep her straight.

"Aeris, come on, just a little longer" Cloud said softly, giving her a gentle shake.

"Five more minutes Mom" she murmured.

"_AERIS WAKE UP!"_ Jen screeched, making Sunstroke squeak.

"WAA!" Aeris cried and nearly fell off.

"Mother was that entirely necessary?" Cloud asked.

"_Kept you from having an accident, didn't it?"_ she answered; he could tell that she was smiling broadly.

"Aeris nearly fell off!" Cloud yelled as they got back to the paddock.

"_Oh, I'm sorry Aeris, I didn't mean for that to happen"_ she apologised.

The couple walked in and Aeris hung up, it was ten past midnight.

"Well it's not as late as it could have been" Tiler stated "now off to bed, both of you!"

Aeris never got the chance to ask where she was sleeping; she just fell asleep into Cloud's arms.

"Uhhh, where _is_ she sleeping?" Cloud asked.

"With you, we're expecting a storm tonight so it isn't safe to use the tent" Jen explained, much to Cloud's confusion.

"Ok ... Mom ... could you ... get her into her pyjamas?" Cloud asked, blushing.

"Sure darling" she answered smiling.

Cloud carried Aeris into his room and gently placed her on his bed, then quickly scampered out of the room as fast as he could.

Jen did her best to get Aeris out of her clothes, without waking her up, she'd gotten her out of everything and was now fetching her pyjamas, when Aeris woke up and realised that she was naked. She bolted upright and made Jen jump.

"What's going on?" she asked, fear evident in her voice.

"Shhh, it's okay Aeris, you were asleep and I was changing you into your pyjamas, Cloud's standing outside waiting for me to say that he can enter" Jen explained soothingly, handing Aeris her clothes, she dressed for bed quickly and went to the bathroom, Cloud was allowed back in and Jen left for her own room.

Cloud heard the conversation from the corridor, so he didn't need to ask where Aeris was, he quickly got into his tracksuit bottoms, his PJ's, and heard the toilet flush, the sink run and a knock on the bathroom door.

"It's ok" he called and Aeris came in.

"Where am I sleeping?" she asked.

"In here, there's a storm coming tonight and it's not safe to use the tent" he answered.

"Ok then" she said, smiling, and gave him a goodnight kiss.

Cloud quickly used the bathroom, washed his hands and joined her.

They cuddled, he kissed her forehead, she kissed his neck and they fell asleep.

Cloud's last coherent thought was 'this has been the best night of my life'.

**And that's all until next week. I'll tell you this much, it's my first ever lime chapter, now you have something to look forward to ^__^**


	11. Learning Their Way Around

**Disclaimer: I own nothing, not even my mind.**

**Hi all, hope you've been looking forward to this one, enjoy! I KNOW I'm two days late updating, but the website refused to let me log in ... sorry :(**

Chapter 11 – Learning Their Way Around

Cloud awoke the next day to find that his bed was empty, of Aeris at least, at first he panicked, thinking that last night had just been a dream, but then decided not to worry about it, surely that just meant it was still Friday and he could make his dream a reality that night.

He got out of bed and went straight for the bathroom, not noticing the small bundle of clothes by the door, he opened the door, it didn't have a lock, and walked in on Aeris, stepping out of the shower, she screamed and so did he.

"CLOUD! DON'T YOU KNOW HOW TO KNOCK?!" she screeched.

"OH MY GOD I AM _SO_ SORRY" he cried, covering his eyes and turning away "I … woke up alone and thought I'd imagined last night … I didn't know you were in here" he mumbled apologetically.

"That's alright" she said, wrapping a towel around herself, it was rather small and only just reached from her breasts to her upper thigh "it's okay now, you can look."

Cloud turned around, blushing, and turned even redder "Wow, do you wear that often? It looks good on you" he said then clapped a hand over his mouth.

"Why Cloud, I do believe you just flirted with me" Aeris said, smiling.

Cloud uncovered his mouth "Did I?"

She nodded, and then crooked a finger at him. He took the hint and walked towards her, she placed her arms around his neck, making the towel loosen slightly, and pulled him down for a deep kiss.

Cloud completely forgot about using the toilet and started walking backwards, taking Aeris with him, along the way her towel fell off completely, they didn't care. Cloud eventually found his bed and fell backwards, now he was laying on his bed, looking up at Aeris, who had released him when he fell, standing in her naked glory. He sat up and she leaned down and kissed him again, he started to lay back and she crawled on top of him.

They were laying there, Cloud on his bed topless and Aeris on top of him completely naked, making out like there was no tomorrow. Suddenly Aeris stopped, Cloud wasn't sure why, until he started to feel uncomfortable, he looked down and saw a bulge in his tracksuit.

"I guess I'm doing the right thing" Aeris said with a seductive smirk and carried on kissing him, Cloud groaned in both pleasure and discomfort, noticing this, Aeris boldly reached into Cloud's tracksuit and adjusted his dick, making his breath hitch.

"Aeris" he moaned "I love you."

She nibbled on his neck "I love you too" she replied.

They froze at a knock on the door, they didn't get the chance to do anything though, and Tifa walked in on them.

"Oh, was I interrupting anything?" she asked with a cheeky grin on her face.

Aeris blushed and ran into the bathroom.

"Well, did I?" she asked again.

"Not really" Cloud answered "just my first ever make out session" he finished innocently.

"Just don't rush her Cloud, Zak tried that, and I kicked him in the balls" she turned to leave the room and turned back "by the way, cold showers tend to help with …" she pointed to the bulge in his groin and, taking the hint, he nodded in thanks.

He grabbed his towel, which was considerably larger than the one Aeris had used, and knocked on the bathroom door.

"Aeris, can I come in?"

She didn't answer, she just opened the door.

He kissed her again, but only quickly "I need a shower" she nodded.

"A cold one?" she asked, he nodded "can we share?"

He smirked "Thought you'd never ask" he said, and picking her up and carrying her, went into the shower and it on, she squealed at how cold it was, but soon they both sighed.

"Uhhh, Cloud? You're still wearing your tracksuit" Aeris pointed out, he smiled and removed them, now they were standing under the shower, shivering slightly as the cold water cascaded down their bodies, Cloud decided to hold Aeris and share their body heat, he could feel himself calming down, it didn't take long for them to decide they'd been freezing long enough.

Cloud stepped out of the shower first, placing his wet PJ's in the sink to drain out, he wrapped himself in his towel and then opened his arms for Aeris to join him. She did so and they held each other, Cloud rubbing the towel at her back, eventually Aeris turned around and they walked back into his room.

"Please tell me you haven't" Jen begged from Cloud's bedroom doorway, Tifa had left it open.

"Didn't what?" Cloud asked innocently.

"You know damned well what!" Jen snapped, causing Cloud to flinch.

"Not really, are you asking if we had sex? Or if we didn't do something else?" Cloud replied fearfully.

Jen sighed "Did you two just have sex in there?" she asked, pointing at the bathroom.

"No" they both said calmly.

"We just shared a cold shower together" Aeris elaborated.

"I remember having to have my fair share of those in my life" she replied with an absent smile on her face.

"Mum can we get dressed … please?"

Jen didn't answer; she just left, closing the door behind her.

"Is this moving too fast?" Cloud asked "I've only known you one week and after our first date not only do I see you totally naked but I get you in the shower."

"Hmm, we do seem to be going a little fast, faster than I did with Zak, but somehow, it doesn't bother me, at least not as much as it did when I was with Zak" Aeris answered.

They stayed there though, Aeris' back to Cloud, he continued to rub his hands over the towel to dry her while she held it in place, it felt romantic to her.

Their moment was soon disturbed again, this time be Sephiroth barging in.

"That's it I'm getting a lock for that door!" Cloud yelled.

"Oh … sorry, (of all the things I'd never expect) me and Tifa were thinking on going swimming and wondered if you'd like to join us?" Seph explained.

"Yes Seph, we'd love to" Aeris answered sweetly "NOW GET OUT OF HERE!"

He didn't need telling twice, he ran, closing the door behind him.

Cloud continued what he was doing, chuckling to himself as he did so, Aeris didn't need to ask what was funny, seeing Seph run like that was hilarious.

Cloud had now gotten around to Aeris' legs and accidently brushed his thumb against her womanhood, she whimpered slightly.

"What's wrong?" Cloud asked.

"Do that again?" Aeris moaned quietly.

Cloud walked her to his bed and tat down, with her on his lap. He followed her directions to find where his thumb had been and this time he rubbed her on purpose.

She gasped this time, he was getting aroused by her sounds of pleasure and she could tell. Cloud slid his hands under the towel and instinct took over them both, Cloud just went by the sounds that Aeris made, different parts of her caused her to make different noises. And at the same time, Aeris took his member into her hand and started pumping slowly.

While Cloud's right hand was busy with Aeris' clit, she placed his left hand onto her breast and he started massaging it, she quickened her pace on his dick and he did the same, he groaned and she gasped his name.

"Go in" she whispered in his ear, he was slightly confused, Aeris smiled, nipped his ear and then guided two of his fingers to her opening, which was now extremely wet, once Cloud's fingers were positioned to Aeris' liking, she pushed his fingers in.

She started giving Cloud a love bite to muffle her scream of pleasure, at the same time she sped up even more and Cloud decided to start off slowly, exploring Aeris' insides cautiously when he reached a part of her that made her breath hitch he sped up, thinking that she'd enjoy him rubbing that same spot over and over again. He was right, her whimpers of pleasure got louder and louder, regardless of her attempts to keep quiet.

Then it happened. A strange feeling started building in Cloud's dick; it felt as if he needed the toilet, he tried to hold it in, but it just built up and he released it, he couldn't help but moan Aeris' name and at the same time her insides seemed to clench around his fingers and something wet shot into the palm of his hand.

Cloud was about to apologise for peeing on her when she started to mop up her leg, this white thick stuff was all over it, now Cloud knew what had happened, they both climaxed and now Aeris was using the towel to clean up the mess.

"Sorry about that" he said, but she just kissed him.

"Don't be, thank you. That was the best experience of my life" she answered and kissed him deeply.

They were dry now, Aeris placed the, folded, towel in the washing hamper and Cloud got his swim shorts on.

"Cloud, could you help me with this?" Aeris asked, she was still naked and holding up her bikini set.

"Sure, what do I need to do?" he asked.

Aeris held the bottom half of her bikini, covering her womanhood and ass, and asked Cloud to tie knots in the strings for her. He did so, she was happy to see that he'd tied them in such a way that they could easily be pulled undone later, next she held her top over her breasts and he didn't need to be asked to tie the knots again, this time it was slightly more complicated, Aeris' breasts kept trying to undo the strings as Cloud tried to tie them. Eventually they were both ready to go and Jen gave them fresh towels.

"What took you so long?" Seph asked impatiently as Cloud and Aeris walked in, they both blushed, giving Seph and Tifa a clear idea of Seph's answer.

Once Cloud and Aeris got into the water they were separated, Seph held Cloud against the edge of the pool and Tifa dragged Aeris to the other end.

"So … which was it? Sex or just roaming hands?" Seph demanded quietly "trust me Aeris is getting the same question from Tifa … just in different words" and sure enough Aeris _was_ being questioned.

"Did you two _do it_? Or did you just jump to third base?" Tifa asked Aeris.

Both Aeris and Cloud blushed, but grinned and explained.

"Roaming hands then, you're moving pretty fast Cloud" Seph said.

"Third base, that's quicker than with Zak" Tifa stated.

"Well it was an accident at first" Cloud said and explained what happened, much to Sephiroth's amusement.

"I honestly don't care, Zak never loved me, Cloud does … I can just tell … is that weird?" Aeris asked, Tifa shook her head and told Aeris that she was starting to feel like that with Seph.

"So what was it like?" Sephiroth and Tifa asked at the same time though, being at opposite ends of the pool and speaking so quietly, they didn't know.

"Just … wow" Cloud answered absentmindedly.

"I've never had such a great experience before" Aeris told Tifa.

"Trust me, if that felt so good, sex'll feel much better, but since you've never had it before, it'll probably hurt, but only at first" Seph and Tifa, again, said at the same time.

Cloud and Aeris both felt their stomachs drop.

"Well maybe … but not for a while" they both said to their interrogator.

"Right, now that that's over, it's only nine am, we've got two hours until we've got to meet everyone else, who's up for volleyball?" Sephiroth announced.

They all agreed, the teams, for now, were Aeris and Tifa vs. Cloud and Seph.

"Are we meant to lose this game?" Cloud muttered to his brother.

"That's impossible to say, one the one hand we win, and they complain that we were suppose to lose to our girlfriends, on the other hand, we lose and they complain that we went too easy on them. Win or lose, we lose" Seph explained in quiet tones.

And he was semi right, the boys won and Tifa complained Aeris just hugged Cloud and thanked him for playing to the best of his ability.

"At least this way I'll know when I'm getting better" she explained.

It was still only half past nine so they played another game, this time it was Cloud and Aeris vs. Sephiroth and Tifa.

They never got a winner; it was tied at fifteen all. That was mainly due to Jen calling them in and saying that Rikku called to remind them when they were meeting, and since it was ten already, they could go now and have some time to lounge around at the beach.

That sounded like a good idea so they got out, showered and got a few pieces of clothing on (the guys got on sandals and the girls got on summer shorts and sandals) and left for the beach.

They arrived, with quarter of an hour to spare, to find that Tidus, Shuyin, Yuna and Lenne were already there.

"Hey guys" Seph called, causing them to look up, Shuyin was applying sun lotion to Lenne's skin, she wasn't too pleased that he stopped but said hi anyway, she pulled him back to what he was doing and she actually moaned with pleasure to having him slide his, slightly cold due to the lotion, hands over her warm skin.

Yuna and Tidus had stopped reading a romantic novel, they had a copy each, to say hi and now they were going back to it.

Tifa dropped her towel in between the two couples, removed her shorts and sandals, and dragged Seph towards the water; he didn't resist much, except to remove his footwear too.

Aeris too stripped down, to her bikini set, set her towel down on the sand and laid down. Cloud followed suit and asked Shuyin if he could borrow the lotion bottle, it was empty but Shuyin happened to have another one, he tossed it to Cloud and he, slowly and gently, started rubbing it all over Aeris' exposed skin.

"Mmm, that feels good" Aeris moaned.

"Get a room you two" Yuffie cried as she ran up to them.

Cloud shrugged "Tried that but everyone kept walking in on us" replied with a smirk.

"Yeah right" Yuffie said, not believing him.

Ignoring her, Aeris rolled over and allowed Cloud to put some lotion on her back too.

Zell turned up soon after Yuffie and they both joined Sephiroth and Tifa in the water. Over the next five minutes Squall, Rinoa, Selphie, Rikku, Wakka, Lulu, Paine and Baralai arrived.

It was five minutes after they were meant to meet and Rikku was complaining.

"Where's Gippal?" she whined, and Selphie wasn't being much better.

The two guys arrived a full ten minutes late, not that Cloud and Aeris minded, they got a chance to cuddle on the beach, but Rikku gave Gippal an almighty punch to the stomach, for both being late and making her worry. Irvine got off better; he simply got suffocated by a kiss from Selphie.

The crusaders started off by showing their newest members how to get to each member's house from their own, on foot, by car and chocobo. Then they showed them how to get to their favourite teens club, which was kinda like a pub or bar except for underage teenagers, it never stored alcohol and was open until nine pm on school nights and until eleven pm on all other nights.

There was a fair coming during the winter break and the next stop on Cloud's and Seph's tour of the island was where they were meeting to go there. After that they braked for lunch, Yuna's parents were meeting them on the beach with a picnic.

There sat Yuna's parents with the biggest blanket that Cloud had seen in his life. Her father was about five and a half foot in height, and was rather skinny, but very fit too; he had blue/grey eyes and a kind, slightly lined face. His hair was greying and grew to about his shoulders; he wore it in two ponytails on either side of his face and the rest just falling down the back.

Yuna's mother was tall, slim and blond. She was only slightly taller than her husband, had Rikku's Al Bhed eyes and she still looked young and vibrant, it was hard to tell that she and Yuna's Dad were relatively the same age.

"Hi Aunt Kitty, how's it going Uncle Braska?" Rikku asked, plopping down on the blanket.

"We're fine Rikku, how's Cid? I haven't spoken to him in a while" Yuna's mother answered.

"He's ok, Brother's still living off him like mad, everywhere he goes for work he either tried hitting on his co-workers and getting fired, or he tries hitting on customers and getting fired" Rikku explained, with a little bit of anger in her voice "brighter note, meet our newest members."

"Hello, I'm Katherine Lesca, but please call me Kitty" Kitty said, shaking hands with Sephiroth and Cloud.

"I'm Sephiroth; feel free to call me Seph"

"I'm Cloud, pleasure to meet you"

"No nickname?" Braska asked, holding his hand out to the brothers, which they accepted.

"Other than bird brain I don't think so" Tifa piped up, earning a round of laughs and a scowl from Cloud "what? You do love chocobos" she pointed out.

"I'm Braska by the way" Braska called loudly, trying to stop an argument before it started, he seemed as wise as his voice made him out to be.

"Please help yourselves" Kitty offered, motioning to the four baskets.

Everyone helped with unpacking the baskets, there were sandwiches of various kinds, everyone, except Cloud and Seph, went for a specific type of sandwich.

"Now we didn't know what you two liked so, for the first time ever, we've brought our ingredients with us to experiment with" Braska explained.

It took only five minutes, Cloud opted for a ham and cheese mix and Seph went with ham, cheese and pickled egg, much to Cloud's distaste.

After everyone had finished eating a few of them went off swimming, Aeris tried to drag Cloud along, but he opted to stay and get to know Kitty and Braska better, but instead of that happening Kitty suggested a sleepover that night at their house, Seph had had enough of swimming for one day and called home to ask about it.

After his parents said yes, Seph passed his phone around so that everyone else could ask theirs; eventually everyone had permission for the sleepover.

Cloud spent the rest of his time with Aeris in the water, they played around, splashing water at each other, tackling each other occasionally, they decided to stop though when Cloud tackled Aeris and knocked her bikini off, he had to cup her left breast to keep anyone from noticing, but thankfully she managed to put it back.

"That was fun" Cloud stated, slightly sarcastically.

"Definitely" Aeris replied with a seductive voice, which caused Cloud to blush slightly, they got called back and Cloud gave her a quick, but deep, kiss before heading back to the beach.

The next, and last, stop on the tour was the Blitzball stadium, where Cloud and Sephiroth got to meet Jecht Watanuki, Tidus and Shuyin's Dad. They had to wait to meet him because he was playing for the Besaid Aurochs, against the Kilika Beasts, the crusaders pretty much had season tickets, they paid for Cloud and Seph to get in and the game was awesome, if a little one-sided, Jecht pretty much won the game for the Aurochs, his Jecht Shot Mark III was perfection, Seph vowed to try and learn it, but Tidus told him, he'd been trying to for three years already.

After the match Jecht walked up to the crusaders to ask them how they thought the match went.

"Nice shot as usual Dad" Tidus called approvingly.

Jecht just shrugged "Ah too easy, gimme the Goers or Abes any day, then it's a challenge. So, these the new guys?" he asked, gesturing to Cloud and Sephiroth, who nodded "I hear you're good in the pool, care to show me?"

"You're on!" Seph said challengingly.

Cloud just nodded nervously, he'd only ever gone up against his class mates.

In the sphere pool, Cloud was placed in goal with Jecht shooting at him, while Sephiroth was at the other end of the pool, shooting against the Aurochs' goalkeeper.

Jecht pulled off his Jecht Shot Mark III, he kicked the ball at one on the posts on the triangular goal, then punched it at another, then headed it at the third (with defenders involved it would knock them out of the way), it shot upwards and Jecht followed it, he spun several times and kicked it at the goal again, Cloud knew it was going to spin too. It did, he dived for it and, more by luck than judgement; just managed to deflect it from his goal.

Jecht, his sons too, nearly died from shock, no one had ever saved that shot before, normally that shot could have been used to save a win for the Aurochs, even their own goalkeeper could never save that shot. Everyone surfaced, mainly because they forgot to hold their breath.

"HOW THE HELL DID YOU DO THAT!" yelled Jecht, still in shock.

"Just lucky I guess" Cloud answered with a shrug.

Seph and the Aurochs' keeper, named Keepa went back down so that Seph could try his shot, he took a chance at The Jecht Shot, he actually pulled it off, but totally missed the goal, but he tried again, an ordinary shot this time, and scored.

Jecht said Sephiroth had potential for being trained in The Jecht Shot, but Seph declined, he preferred to learn by practise, he already had the technique, all he needed was to get the aim right.

The Aurochs' manager watched the whole thing and told the Strife brothers that, if they were interested there'd be a spot open for them on the team once their education was over, which pleased Tidus since that meant he was no longer the only one.

After that the crusaders broke up and went home, so that they could grab their things, spare swim stuff included because Yuna's parents had a bigger pool in their back garden, and then went over to her place.

**Tune in next week where I've written my first lemon.**


	12. Cloud and Aeris' First Time

**Disclaimer: I own nothing to do with Final Fantasy.**

**Hi all, I'm back with my first ever lemon, please don't flay me alive if it was poorly written, I'm in experienced.**

Chapter 12 – Cloud and Aeris' First Time

"Whoa, check it out" Seph said in awe, and Cloud could hardly blame him, Yuna's house was huge. Three floors, white washed, no idea how many rooms, one thing was for certain, it was bigger than Cloud's and Seph's house.

"How'd you get this place Yuna?" Cloud asked as they walked in.

"Well my Grandfather owed this business which he passed onto someone else, he renamed it, but my Dad is the biggest shareholder and since he's retired he's been living off the dividends" she explained.

She walked Cloud and Seph up to the top floor and showed them around their rooms, they had a double bed in each, an adjoining bathroom (which, Yuna explained, Cloud had to share with Aeris and Seph had to share with Tifa) which had a huge bath tub and a separate shower.

"Now, just to let you know, for some reason this house was built with soundproof bedrooms, so if you injure yourself there's an intercom that will only activate when you say 'good God, someone help me please' clearly, anything else and it won't work" she finished explaining and left them to unpack their things.

"Well I am most certainly gonna put the soundproof bedroom to good use" Seph said with a smirk and started leaving the room "maybe you will too, eh Cloud?"

Cloud didn't get the chance to do anything about it because his brother just bolted.

"I hear we're sharing a bathroom" Aeris said, having just walked through the bathroom and into Cloud's room.

He nodded "Yeah, and look" he walked over to the bedroom door, closed it and grinned as he locked it "I finally have a bedroom with a lock!"

Aeris smirked seductively, ran into her room to lock her door and came back.

"I've got an idea for how we can use that" she said, placing her arms around his neck and pulling him down for a kiss.

They slowly made their way to the bed, laid down and lost themselves to each other. Their hands roamed everywhere; tongues danced together and, boldly, Cloud reached down to stroke Aeris between her legs.

She gasped and took hold of Cloud's hand "Wait, not here, not now. I love you but can we do that later?" she asked him with a quick, chaste kiss. Cloud nodded and kissed her back, only deeper.

They helped each other unpack their clothes; the group was staying for the rest of the weekend, and headed downstairs to see what everyone was doing.

Seph had already joined, most of, the guys in a tournament on the games console, on a game called Ace Combat 6 (A/N awesome game, which I do not own), and wasn't doing too well, his plane had been shot down sixteen times already, according to Rikku.

Everyone else was outside, in their swim gear, having a water gun war, with water balloons included of course, they offered Cloud and Aeris to join in and they agreed. It took about five minutes for them to find their rooms again and get their gear on, Cloud offered to help Aeris with tying her strings again and she let him, helping him to cop a feel in the process.

Now Cloud had a huge rifle that contained about a gallon of water with a blast range of four meters, but because of the weight it was hard to use and impossible for him to carry balloons, which was why Aeris teamed up with him, she only had balloons and a dustbin lid.

Halfway through the battle, Seph snuck up on Paine and tossed her into the pool, much to her annoyance.

"Hurt time!" she bellowed and charged after him, followed closely by everyone else, it soon turned into a wrestling match to get him chucked in too. There were many casualties, Shuyin fell in first, lucky for him he was already in his shorts, Tifa wasn't so lucky, Sephiroth picked her up bodily and hurled her in, she landed alright, but she was wearing a white tee shirt that turned see through when wet, and she wasn't wearing a bra.

As Cloud hid his eyes and turned away, Seph just jeered playfully "Looking good baby" he soon followed, he'd let his guard down and was shoved by everyone, and then he was dunked by his girlfriend.

Tifa got out of the pool, covering up as much as she could, and went to get into her swimsuit, since she didn't have any dry clothes without not having enough to last until she got home.

Everyone who wasn't in their swim gear decided to follow suit, Seph included, even Wakka and Tidus went to get some swim shorts on. Those who were already in their swimming attire, jumped in, they spent some time playing water tag, waiting for everyone else to get back, when they did, Aeris decided to jump into the Jacuzzi and asked Cloud to join her.

The bubbles were soothing, Cloud found himself starting to drift off to sleep when he thought he felt something on his lap. His eyes shot open to find Aeris straddling him.

"Hi" he murmured.

"Hey" she answered, rocking her hips slightly, which aroused him.

"Aeris, Yuna says 'no sex in the Jacuzzi'!" Tidus called, making Aeris blush and Yuna slap his arm.

She stopped her rocking and Cloud rested his hands on her hips, she slid off of him and they just sat there cuddling. Cloud started drifting off again and he didn't realise that his hand had slid down slightly.

"So are you going to squeeze? Or do I have to do it myself?" she whispered in his ear.

"What" he asked.

"Your hand is on my ass" she explained quietly, Cloud looked and tried to apologise, but she just took his hand and slid it into her bikini bottoms "I don't mind, so long as they don't find out" she explained, pushing her chest into him a little more, he answered her words by contracting his hand slightly.

"Hey you two, what's up?" Lenne asked at she got in, she was wearing a dark blue, strapless tankini and was followed closely by Shuyin.

"Just enjoying ourselves" Aeris answered.

The crusaders just wasted the afternoon, mucking around in the pool, and at about six pm Braska announced that he and Kitty were going to a dinner party and wouldn't be back until the next day, pizza had been ordered and Yuna knew where the soft drinks were kept.

"Behave yourselves and see you tomorrow" Kitty called in as Braska walked out.

Cloud told Aeris that he was going to grab a bath before the pizza arrived and got out. She soaked herself in the Jacuzzi for only five minutes before leaving to dry off, or so she said.

Once she was inside the house she ran up the stairs and quickly snuck into her bedroom, she found the bathroom unlocked and Cloud soaking in the bathtub; she snuck in behind him and turned on the bubbles, making him jump.

"Hi" she said seductively, climbing in next to him "I thought I'd join you."

"I forgot about your door" Cloud told her, wrapping an arm around her.

"Don't worry I locked my bedroom door"

"So did I"

She smiled and moved his hand to cup her right breast "Help me out of this thing?"

He obliged and soon she was in his lap, kissing him.

"Can we have a repeat of this morning?" Cloud asked, Aeris nodded and went to work.

This time they didn't worry about keeping their noise down, when they climaxed they both screamed the other's name, then they slowly calmed down, Aeris cradling Cloud's head on her bare breasts.

"That was even better than this morning" Cloud observed.

"I hear, from Tifa, that it gets better the more you do it" Aeris answered.

She got out and grabbed a large towel, she placed it around her shoulders and opened her arms, Cloud took the hint and, after climbing out of the tub, stepped into her arms, they stood there, drying each other off, and it felt every bit as romantic as it did that morning, more so since it wasn't interrupted by anyone.

Once they were dry they went to their separate rooms to get dressed, but they kept the bathroom doors open so that they could still see each other, once they were dressed they closed the bathroom door and left their rooms, meeting in the corridor. They held hands and walked downstairs together, just in time to grab the pizza as it was delivered, it was prepaid for so they didn't have to fetch Yuna.

To save time, Aeris used the intercom to inform everyone, wherever they might have been, that the pizza had arrived, mostly everyone had come in from the pool, unsurprisingly Seph and Tifa came from upstairs, Tifa's hair slightly askew but nothing more, they'd obviously not gotten very far. What did catch Cloud off guard was Wakka and Lulu coming downstairs five minutes after his brother and Tifa. Both looked flustered, but highly satisfied.

"So we have pizza, fizzy drinks, all we need now, are some movies" Lulu pointed out.

Everyone agreed and Cloud picked out Benny & Joon, he read the back and asked Yuna if he could have first choice.

"Sure, put it on" she answered.

Everyone grabbed three slices of pizza and a pint of their chosen drink and took a seat in the living room, Cloud was leaning against the side of the sofa, his food and drink next to him, with Aeris on his lap, Cloud hadn't had much experience with movies and actors, but he instantly became a fan of Johnny Depp after the park scene when his character Sam started trying to cheer up Benny and his Sister Joon.

After the end of that movie Rikku, in her hyperactive state, declared that they were having a Johnny Depp night at the top of her lungs, Yuffie started joining in, also in her hyperness, and everyone else agreed just to shut them up.

So next up was Pirates of the Caribbean: The curse of The Black Pearl; after they finished watching that one they looked at the bloopers, which in themselves were funny.

Cloud's favourite blooper had to be when Johnny Depp tried to say one of his ultra-fast lines, and got tongue twisted.

"_Do you have the courage and fortitude to follow orders and staaay … I love you man, let's just face facts. Do you have the courage to forti…? Doyouhavethecourageandfortitudetofollowordersandstaybraveinthe oh god I hate this bloody line, where are the writers? I'm gonna kill them!"_

Throughout the night they watched the second and third Pirates of the Caribbean movies, Chocolat and to finish off the movie run they watched Sweeney Todd.

It wasn't horrific in the sense that you either didn't know when a death was coming or it was a character that was too innocent to have died, it was just the amount of blood, Aeris cringed into Cloud whenever there was blood and he just held her tight, Johnny Depp turned out to be a good singer too. After it was over Zell piped up.

"One thing I don't get" once all eyes were on him he continued "why is it that, even though everyone was sliced from right to left, some sprayed like mad and others just trickled?"

Everyone just gave him the general idea that they didn't know, though Seph decided to be more obvious and say "Fuck knows!"

Yuffie jumped up and yelled for Spin the Bottle and Cloud and Aeris decided to duck out, as the last time they played this game there were only eighteen players, it shouldn't be any different here, besides it was getting onto midnight and Cloud personally was exhausted.

By the time that he and Aeris had gotten to the stairs there had been a bunch of whispering and Rinoa called out "Well no wonder you're exhausted after this morning!" causing Cloud and Aeris to blush.

"Ignore her" Squall advised them and waved at them as if to say 'now get lost'.

Rikku spun first but Cloud never saw who she landed on, however there was a thud as someone was floored and a lot of cat calls.

Aeris gave Cloud a goodnight kiss at her door and they parted ways, Aeris locking her door after she closed it. Cloud walked to his bedroom, unlocked his door and opened it, Aeris practically tackled him and used him to shut the door, whilst she was busy kissing him with a fever, Cloud somehow managed to lock the door again.

Aeris pulled away from him "I love you Cloud" she proclaimed, she took her arms from around his neck and walked to the bed to sit down, Cloud joined her and kissed her again.

"Give me a moment, I need to use the bathroom, you just get changed in here, I won't be long" he got up and walked to the bathroom, closing the door and relieving himself 'too much damn Fanta' he mused to himself.

He flushed and closed the lid to the toilet, washed his hands and changed into the tracksuit bottoms he'd brought with him. He walked back into the bed room to see Aeris already under the covers, with the lights dimmed to a soft romantic level.

She was looking at him intently, her arms holding the cover over her, arms that were bare. Cloud walked up to her nervously, she sat up and hugged him, she was naked.

"I love you Cloud" she told him, pulling him towards the bed.

"I love you too Aeris" he answered, kissing her forehead as he sat down, she was slowly running her hands in circles on his back, he returned the gesture and felt her sigh in pleasure.

"Cloud … are you … still a … virgin?" she queried, he blinked in shock.

He squeaked his reply at first, but managed eventually "Yea, I mean yes", she laughed slightly and cuddled into him even more.

"So am I" she said, making him feel slightly afraid.

"Aeris … is there … a reason you're asking?" he asked.

"Yes … I love you … _way_ more than I've loved anyone else … I want my first time to be with someone that loves me just as much as I love them … I want my first time to be with you" she explained, making him both terrified and slightly aroused.

"I … see" he replied uncertainly.

She tensed at the tone of his voice "You don't like me _that_ much" it wasn't a question, it was a statement.

"NO! No, I do … I'm … just …" he could find the right word, afraid wasn't strong enough and terrified would've hurt her feelings.

"Scared?" she offered, that was the perfect word, mainly because she used it, he nodded "so am I" she murmured and leaned in.

She captured his lips and pressed her body against his, they kissed softly, Cloud traced her lips with his tongue and she bade him entrance to her mouth, her tongue danced with his, tasting, battling for dominance, then a mutual agreement between them.

They slowly stood up, so that Cloud could remove his only item of clothing, and then lay down on the bed. Cloud's calloused hands gently roamed over Aeris' body and her soft ones slid over his back. He broke their kiss, Aeris was about to complain when he kissed her cheek, her jaw, her neck, he continued to travel down her body, leaving a trail of kisses, Aeris moaning and softly screaming in pleasure, then he moved back and captured her lips again.

Slowly Aeris moved her hand down between them both, and gently held his, now throbbing, member and he broke the kiss again.

"Aeris" he groaned in pleasure "are you sure? It's not … too late … to stop."

She shook her head "I want this … I want you" she gently eased him towards her entrance "you're _the one_ I want to give myself to" her emphasis of 'the one' didn't escape his notice.

"Are you ready?" he asked, her eyes were closed, she was braced for the pain that they both knew was coming, she nodded and Cloud pushed in, he felt his skin stretch painfully, she felt her insides being torn to shreds. She cried out in pain, he groaned, though not as much as she did.

Cloud held her close, trying his best to let her know that he was there for her, her arms moved to hold him close as the pain shot through her and slowly, it felt like hours, it ebbed away.

She rocked her hips gently, making his breath hitch, to let him know that she was ok. Cloud took the hint an started pulling out, before pushing gently in, trying to find the same point which made her scream his name earlier. As he started to pull out again she spoke "Ah, Cloud please … go slower".

"Sorry" he groaned, and then she gasped, he stopped "have I hurt you again?"

"No, I think you found 'it' again" she whispered with a grin.

Matching her grin Cloud started thrusting again, keeping the same pace and hitting Aeris' G-spot. Soon she was moaning in pleasure, all of her pain gone "Faster Cloud" she murmured she gasped his name when he did so.

The more Cloud quickened his pace, the louder Aeris would gasp and moan, soon she was screaming softly, he was matching her volume, only in grunts, groans and moaning her name.

Then he started to feel it, that same feeling that he'd felt twice that day already.

"Aeris" he moaned "I think … I'm" she interrupted him.

"Me … too … CLOUD!" she climaxed with a scream of ecstasy, her insides clenched against Cloud's dick and he came too screaming her name for, if the room wasn't soundproofed, the entire world to hear.

Cloud collapsed onto Aeris, his head coming to rest on her breasts, she reached her arms up and cradled his head to her chest.

"I love you Cloud … thank you" she said.

Cloud was amazed "I think I died and went to heaven" he replied, making her laugh. He made to exit her and roll over but she stopped him.

"Stay with me … stay _in_ me?" she begged with a seductive smirk, which Cloud returned, but something caught his eye, something red, he looked down and saw blood on him, Aeris and the white satin sheets.

This time Aeris failed to stop him from exiting her, mainly because she had gotten scared, Cloud had already gotten on his PJ's and bolted from the room with a 'I'll get help'.

He ran down the stairs and found that everyone had moved onto Truth or Dare and Yuna was in the process of hardening Paine's nipples, she inadvertently moaned in pleasure and that ended the dare, much to everyone laughing.

Cloud calmly cleared his throat "Tifa … could you come with me please, I've got a small problem" she stood and followed Cloud, Seph coming too with concern in his eyes.

He led them to his room, finding that Aeris was in the bathroom panicking, Cloud said nothing, but showed them the bed. Tifa nodded in understanding and charged into the bathroom to find Aeris naked and shaking.

"Tifa … s-something's wrong" she cried, shaking uncontrollably, Tifa cut her off with a gentle hug.

"Shhh it's ok honey, it's ok … you had sex with him … didn't you?" Aeris shook her head.

"No … I made love to him" Tifa grinned.

"Well don't worry, its natural for every girl on her first time to bleed, that's what the pain you felt was" Tifa explained, she helped Aeris to the bath and helped her clean the blood from her pelvic region and any that remained inside of her.

Meanwhile Seph was smiling proudly at Cloud, also explaining to him what Tifa had told Aeris, knowing that Aeris was going to be fine and that she wasn't in any danger made Cloud feel much better.

Seph knocked on the bathroom door "Tifa is it ok for me to grab something to tidy the bed up with?"

"No … but Aeris says Cloud can come in" she called, Cloud went in, with Seph facing the bed and asked what he was after, he understood why Sephiroth wasn't allowed in, Aeris was naked in the bath and Tifa was helping her get cleaned up, which for Aeris was starting to prove difficult since her pain was starting to come back.

Cloud grabbed what Seph told him to, some toilet roll and a damp face cloth, and hurried from the room, closing the door behind him. They cleaned off the small pool with the toilet roll, stripped the bed and cleaned the soaked in blood as best they could with the cloth. Sephiroth then sent Cloud back into the bathroom to dispose of the, now red, toilet roll.

As he watched the red paper sink away past the u-bend, Aeris was drying off.

"You'll be limping a bit tomorrow, just tell everyone that you sprained your ankle ok?" Tifa explained.

"You know Tifa, you'd make a good nurse, probably an even better doctor, thanks for the help by the way" Cloud said, bowing in thanks.

"No problem, now seriously guys, after what you've done it's traditional to share a bed for the rest of the night naked, just some advice. Oh and don't worry about this happening again, I guarantee it won't" she finished with a smile; Cloud crossed the room and held Aeris tight in her towel, drying her off slowly.

Seph knocked and poked his head in "I wouldn't advise using this bed again tonight, its soaked, but clean" he said and Cloud, keeping his back to his brother, saluted and carried Aeris, bridal style, to her own bed.

Seph and Tifa simply took their leave, knowing that this was their moment "Are we telling the others?" Seph asked.

"No, if they ask we'll just simply say that Aeris heard something and Cloud thought it best to investigate but not by himself, we've found nothing" Tifa answered sternly.

After he finished drying her off, Cloud removed the towel and tucked Aeris in "I'll be right back ok" he walked through the bathroom to his own room, locked his bedroom door and ran back to her "do you want me with you? I can always sleep on the floor" Cloud offered, kneeling next to her.

She never said a word; she just stood him up, pulled his tracksuit down and then pulled him in next to her.

"I'm sorry I hurt you" he said holding her in his arm, her head was lying on his chest and he was rubbing her back slowly.

"I know, but don't be, it was worth it … I love you so much" she finished, curling closer to him and laying one of her legs in between his.

"I love you too Aeris" he replied, kissing her deeply, she kissed back and soon, they fell asleep like that, lips locked together bodies pressed together, her arms locked around his neck and his around her waist.

**Now unfortunately you people have caught up to me, so I'll not be able to update until the next chapter is finished (which may be a while given that my college coursework is becoming more and more demanding … sorry ******


	13. Sad News

**Hi everyone. I'm sorry to disappoint you, but I'm going on a hiatus with this story, I'm stuck on what I'm writing and really need to collect my thoughts. If you really want to see me update sooner rather than later, then please, feel free to review this (crummy) chapter or send me a PM with suggestions, ideas or (as they say on Mock The Week) Scenes We'd Like To See (Tee Hee Hee).**

**For those of you who like reading my work I shall be continuing with another story (which I know exactly what I'm doing with), it's titled Harry Potter and the Jedi Wizard, and it's part one of and (at least) 8 part series, feel free to play catch up on it, you can find it through my profile (I personally find that method easiest).**

**Again, sorry for any disappointments, I promise THIS IS ONLY A BREAK, this story has fallen ill but NOT died.**


	14. The Morning Aftr & Punishments

**Hi everyone, I am SOOOOO sorry that I've taken such an eternity to update, but thankfully I'm on my holidays and I'll be able to keep up better.**

Chapter 13 – The Morning After & Punishments

Aeris first felt heat on her face, coming in short bursts, then she felt something hard against her stomach, 'what the hell?' the wondered.

She opened her eyes and stared into Cloud's, still sleeping, face and smiled. Last night was, her bleeding scare excluded, perfect. She looked down and saw what was pressing into her and smiled to herself, seemed that Cloud was having a good dream; she slowly moved up his body and kissed his neck.

"Mmm … Aeris," he moaned quietly.

Satisfied that he was dreaming about her she quietly slipped out of bed and limped into the bathroom to have a shower, leaving Cloud covered in the bed. She stepped into the shower, leaving the bathroom door open, and smiled as the hot water soothed her, slightly aching, body and woke her up.

Cloud woke up and had to wonder why he was in bed naked, but then he heard the shower running and saw the bathroom door open. Grinning evilly, he climbed out of bed and crept into the shower behind his girlfriend.

He wrapped his arms around her and she jumped.

"Morning beautiful" he greeted, holding her stomach tightly.

She leaned her head back and allowed Cloud to kiss her neck "Mmm, morning" she half moaned.

Cloud turned her around, his lips never leaving her skin for more that half a second at most, once she was facing him she pressed her breasts against him and pulled his head deeper into her neck, making her moan slightly louder.

Cloud then got slightly overzealous and pushed Aeris against the wall; then he pulled her leg up over his hip.

"Cloud" she gasped "this is going too far too fast!"

He pulled back "I'm … sorry, I don't know what came over me" he told her sheepishly and released her leg.

She placed her hand on his cheek and he held it there. "How about we do this tonight?"

Cloud, gently, pushed her against the cold wall, making her moan in a mixture of pleasure and discomfort, and kissed her deeply, he pulled back and she pouted.

"Ok then" he leaned in close to her ear "but how about something else for now?"

Before she had the chance to ask what he meant, his hand was holding her womanhood, a single finger stroking her entrance, she moaned his name softly, and that encouraged him to stroke her slightly faster.

It didn't take long for Aeris to grab him and start pumping; they kept their pace for five minutes until Aeris stopped.

"Cloud, take me" Cloud removed his finger from inside her and stared at her "please?"

He nodded and picked her up, she positioned her legs on either side of his waist and he balanced her weight, his hands under her legs, her back laid against the wall. She held his member gently and positioned him at her entrance, he looked into her eyes, asking for permission, she nodded and he lowered her onto himself.

She screamed in pleasure and he yelled, it didn't hurt at all this time, they stayed like that for a while; then Aeris wrapped her legs around his back and thrust her hips into him. Taking the hint, Cloud started thrusting; Aeris held her arms around his neck and pulled herself up and down, allowing Cloud to massage her breasts.

They kept up their pace for an hour before they climaxed and Cloud's legs gave way from the pleasure.

Lying on the shower floor with the shower soaking their bodies Aeris asked "How about we just stay here for a bit?" while running her fingers over his relaxing muscles.

He chuckled "Sounds like a plan to me."

So they did, they just stayed there, holding each other, but after a few minutes, Aeris got up, pulled Cloud to his feet and asked him to help wash her back.

Five minutes and one love making session later they were both clean, dry and dressed.

They left Aeris' room and walked downstairs hand-in-hand with knowing smiles on their faces.

"Ooh, somebody had fun last night!" Rikku stated devilishly.

Cloud blushed and Aeris simply glared at her.

"So what if we did?" Aeris asked defiantly.

With that everyone swooped down on them, the girls pulled Aeris away and the guys shoved Cloud into a corner.

"How was your first time Cloud?"

"How big is his penis?"

"How long did it last?"

"How many times did you do it?"

These were just a few of the questions that were thrown at them, they skipped their way around the truth but one that they couldn't avoid was …

"Did you use protection?"

"Pardon?" Cloud answered, perplexed.

"Well, um, no." Aeris answered sheepishly.

"You know ya? Protection, a condom or The Pill, ya? Wakka asked.

"I don't think so." Cloud answered, his eyes glued to his feet.

"That was kinda irresponsible Cloud." Seph stated calmly.

"Aeris, you know that was kind of dumb, seriously how many times?" Tifa asked.

"Ummm, three times?" Aeris answered, not having kept count.

"Three times without protection? Are you insane?" Lulu exploded.

"You're one to talk Lulu, trust me when I say; I can tell you're pregnant." Paine stated, and the other girls, excluding Aeris, agreed.

By now everyone was in the same conversation.

"I think she's got a point Lu, you took one look at your breakfast this morning and that was it, yet you look just fine, classic morning sickness." Baralai explained.

"Yeah, well … I just don't want Aeris in my position!" Lulu cried as she burst into tears.

Everyone helped Lulu into the living room and sat her down, Tifa and Yuffie did what they could to calm her down while Cloud and Aeris got something to eat.

When they came back Lulu had stopped crying.

"I'm sorry Aeris; I shouldn't be trying to run your life for you." Lulu said while hugging Aeris.

"It's alright Lulu, besides, I don't really believe in those kinds of things."

"Well that makes you better than me."

"Why?"

"Because I simply couldn't be bothered to wait for Wakka to put it on this one time, you simply think they're wrong, if you ever get in my position it'll be for your beliefs."

"What position would that be exactly?" Braska asked walking in.

"We … we Uhhh, think Lulu's pregnant." Yuna explained and Braska's eye twitched.

"I see, well instead of jumping to conclusions; why not get her checked?" he asked.

"Aren't doctor's practises closed on Sundays?" Cloud asked.

"Yes, however my Dad used to be the local doctor." Yuna explained "He still has permission to go in for personal emergencies."

Without another word Braska bundled Lulu and Wakka into his car and started the engine, leaving Kitty to look after everyone.

"So who else jumped into the sack?" she asked.

Cloud and Aeris put their hands up, along with Seph and Tifa, Rikku and Gippal, Yuffie and Zell, and Shuyin and Lenne.

"Ok, now put your hands down if it was safe" everyone except Cloud and Aeris put their hands down "Right, follow me."

She took them to the car and explained to Braska.

Cloud got into the front with Braska and Aeris got into the back next to Lulu.

"So who else got involved?" Braska asked after they left.

Cloud told him who'd admitted to it.

"I'm not overly pleased with this; however I can't stop you from showing how much you love someone. My only two concerns are what your parents will think and do when they find out they're to be grandparents, and if you two _are_ expecting" he looked at Lulu and Aeris in the rear view mirror "how are you going to manage school?"

Cloud was lost in thought from that, what if he'd made Aeris pregnant, he'd never leave her, that was certain, there was no way in hell that they were old enough to get married, and as for school, Aeris could manage to go for a few months and after he could always make two sets of notes in class.

They arrived, Cloud not even realising that they'd gotten there.

"Cloud, come on wake up." Aeris joked.

"Right coming." Cloud half-yelled.

Aeris giggled and took his hand.

While inside Dr Braska had Lulu go first, he gave her a sample cup and asked her to fill it, when she came back it didn't take long for Cloud to realise what she'd filled it with and turned his back in mild disgust.

Once Lulu's 'sample' had gone into the examination process, Aeris was given a similar cup and asked to fill it, she too left for the bathroom, Cloud kept his back turned until Aeris told him it was safe.

Half an hour later the results were through.

"Lulu, you are pregnant, and have been for about a week" he explained, Wakka placed an arm around her shoulders and tried to comfort her "Aeris, you and Cloud are safe, but please be more careful in future. Oh and not to worry Cloud, you don't have any sexually transmitted dieses, if you did Aeris would have been infected by now and it would've shown up on the tests." Both Cloud and Aeris sighed in relief.

"I'd have been happy either way." Cloud whispered in Aeris' ear and she blushed and gave him a quick kiss.

"What are we going to do Wakka?" Lulu cried into his shoulder.

"Well, most of it is up to you ya; we can either abort, or start thinking of names."

"Do you want to be a father?"

"With you yeah, with anyone else no way, ya?"

Lulu smiled "Then we need to start thinking of names." She said and sealed the deal with a kiss.

Braska gave them a lift back to his home so that they could spread the news, the girls all thought that Aeris was lucky, but nonetheless, since Lulu wanted to be a mother, they were all ecstatic.

"Uhhh, question. Who's got the job of telling Wakka's and Lulu's parents, and how the hell are they going to do it?" Zell asked.

Nobody quite knew how to answer that, Wakka said he'd tell his parents and in fact suggested that he and Lulu head home to tell them today, rather than wait until after school tomorrow and have the fear of their reaction looming over them in class, as to how, that was a different question entirely.

Braska offered them a lift home and waited for them to pack their things; they came down the stairs looking rather glum.

"Don't worry so much, my brother was in your position once, my parents handled it quite well, just one bit of advice, if they decide to punish you, don't argue." Kitty told them.

Lulu and Wakka got into the car and left, everyone else was feeling a little down, they felt bad for Lulu and Wakka, but it was Yuffie that suggested everyone having a swim to take their minds off of things.

Everyone quickly ran upstairs and got into their swim gear and met in the pool.

They started off with a game of Blitzball, not really keeping score, once they were board of that they switched to Volleyball, there were too many players for that so Cloud and Aeris took a timeout in the Jacuzzi.

It was rather nice, just them, curled into each other with the bubbles swirling everywhere.

But it didn't take long for everyone to get bored of that too and the guys, minus Cloud, went inside to play computer games.

It took about an hour, but eventually everyone decided that, without Lulu and Wakka, it just wasn't as much fun. So everyone got their stuff together and went home.

"Hi Mum," Aeris said as she entered her home, glowing but looking sad at the same time.

"What's the matter sweetheart," Ifalna asked.

"Oh, Lulu and Wakka had to leave early and we just lost the point of staying without them … she's pregnant," Aeris explained feebly.

"Ok that explains the long face, but why are you glowing?" her mother asked suspiciously.

Aeris blushed "Oh … nothing," she lied.

Ifalna gave her an 'I-know-you're-lying' look "Ok, but don't tell daddy," Aeris pleaded and her mother nodded in agreement.

"I'm … oh god I can't say it, you're my mother, it's hard enough talking about it to my friends," Aeris blurted out and that gave it away.

"You're no longer a virgin?" Ifalna asked, Aeris blushed harder and nodded "Cloud?"

"Yes," said Aeris, then she had a quick flashback of last night and grinned, rather stupidly.

"Well that grin clearly states that you're not regretting it, do you love him or was it pure lust?" she asked, being direct and knowing that beating around the bush wasn't the best thing to do right now.

"I'm in love Mum … looking back … I've no idea why I ever went out with Zak, but I never want to be with anyone else after Cloud," Aeris answered, Ifalna smiled warmly at her daughter and rushed forward to hug her.

"YOU DID WHAT!!!" Jen screeched once her son's early return was explained, along with Cloud's antics.

"Jen, calm down!" Tiler told her sternly while giving his youngest son a 'run-now-I'll-hold-her-off' nod towards the stairs.

Seph found the whole thing to be quite hilarious, but left with him.

Five minutes after Jen had stopped yelling she entered Seph's room, Cloud was there too.

"I apologise for losing my temper with you Cloud, but I had hoped that _you_ would at least wait until you were married or at least engaged, but since you waited longer than _I _did I can't really say much, however you are still grounded for a week, you are not to leave the house for anything except school, you're not allowed friends over except for Rikku and you're not to use the pool except for sports homework." She said; which left Cloud's mouth agape.

"Am I still allowed friends over?" Seph asked, trying to make sure that Aeris could still see Cloud.

She looked at her eldest son shrewdly, wondering if he was simply checking to see if he were being punished or trying to save Cloud some misery.

"Besides Tifa, no." she said coming to a decision and leaving the room.

When Seph asked if he could bring friends over, Cloud knew what he was trying to do and his hopes lifted, but now his heart was broken.

"No Aeris for a whole week?" he exclaimed "My life is over,"

With that he bolted out of the door.

"Mom, can I have my phone call?" he asked she gave him a puzzled look so he explained "Well when you get arrested they give you one phone call,"

Tiler laughed at his son's logic and tossed him the phone.

He instantly called Aeris.

"_Hello?_" she said over the phone

"Hi Aeris," he replied

"_Oh hey Cloud,_" she sounded so pleased to hear from him, that she didn't notice the sadness in his voice.

"I've got a bit of bad news," he told her.

"_What is it?_" she asked.

"I've been grounded, I'm not to leave the house except for school, I'm not allowed any friends over except for Rikku and I'm not allowed to use the pool except for homework … and all for a week," he told her miserably, it didn't take long for her to put two and two together.

"_So … I can't see you again until Monday?_" it was more a statement than a question.

"Yes," Cloud answered.

"_Ok then Cloud, I … guess I'll see you tomorrow at school,_" she told him, they said their goodbyes and hung up, cloud handed the phone back to his mother, who had just realised what she'd inadvertently done, and went to his room to do his homework, he pulled it out and thought he'd best do it on his computer, it'd be quicker.

As soon as he turned it on he found Aeris on messenger, trying to talk to him.

Little Pink Flower Girl: Hi Cloud

Cloud quickly closed his door and then answered.

Cloud9Buster Sword: I'm not sure that I'm allowed to do this Aeris

Little Pink Flower Girl: You worry too much, what's the worst they can do to you?

Cloud9Buster Sword: extend my sentence to life?

Little Pink Flower Girl: LOL

Cloud9Buster Sword: THIS ISN'T FUNNY!!! It's only been an hour and I'm missing you already *cries*

As he pressed enter a silent tear rolled down his cheek.

Little Pink Flower Girl: … Cloud, I'm sorry … I'm missing you too

Cloud9Buster Sword: I've gotta go, I only turned on my computer to do my homework, if my Mom comes in and finds me on messenger you'll have to send flowers to my grave

Little Pink Flower Girl: LOL, ok Cloud, I'll try again later, you never said that they're not allowing you on messenger so I'll try again later

Cloud9Buster Sword: I love you

Little Pink Flower Girl: I love you too

Cloud9Buster Sword has signed out

As Cloud started to do his homework, Seph went online and saw Aeris was there, he decided to talk to her, try and make her feel better about what Cloud most likely told her.

Seph spent the rest of the afternoon talking to the others online, Cloud finished his homework within an hour, helped Seph finish his and then shut himself in his room, not wanting to talk to anyone.

Jen was pretty much feeling like crap since Cloud had barricaded his door and refused to eat, but she left his meal where he could easily find it, should he change his mind.

The next morning everyone woke up to find that Cloud's door was wide open, his dinner was eaten and that he'd left a note, saying he'd gone to school already.

The note mentioned that Cloud had left Sunstroke so that he wasn't tempted to sneak over to Aeris' house after school.

At the school, Cloud was just arriving; he walked straight into the building, dropped his things off at his locker and made a beeline for the sphere pool, knowing he had Blitzball first.

He changed quickly and jumped into the pool, doing a few laps around the normal pool to warm up.

"Yo Blondie!" Mr Wallace yelled when he walked in "What cha doin' here?"

"Avoiding …" Cloud mumbled.

"What exactly?" Wallace asked.

"My mother, my friends, pretty much everything I'm being denied while I'm grounded, I'll not bore you with the details." Before Mr Wallace had a chance to ask anything else, Cloud went underwater.

He sat on the bottom, only coming up for air, until the lesson started.

"Listen up, I want everyone to pair up, goalies and strikers, attackers and defenders, stuff like that, I want you practisin' specials on each other and I'm testin' ya at the end of the lesson," Wallace told the class.

Cloud was beginning to wonder if his mother had called ahead and asked the teachers to keep him and Aeris separated, because this lesson plan didn't allow him to pair up with her.

Seph opted to team up with Cloud and spent the entire lesson making venom, sleep, wither and drain shots at Cloud while he half-hearted tried to block the shots and protect himself from the effects.

At the end of the lesson Cloud forced himself to perk up, but only because Aeris was watching him being tested, he wanted to be strong for her.

Mr Wallace gave Cloud a pass and homework to work on getting better at it since he was going to be tested again next week.

Cloud changed quickly, not talking to anyone, and ran out of the changing room, Aeris was waiting for him.

"Hey Cloud," she said, slightly snidely, Cloud winced.

"Hi Aeris," he said, knowing what was coming.

"Why are you avoiding me, no scratch that, why are you avoiding everyone?" she demanded.

"I'm trying to make it less painful, I was thinking that if I avoided you guys, you'd get angry at me and not miss me that much," he explained feebly.

"And after you're grounded?" Baralai asked as he exited the changing room.

"I figured I'd deal with that later, if you guys didn't want me around then I'd have to live with that," he answered.

By now everyone was out of the changing room and they were walking to their magic class.

"Cloud, we'd miss you anyway," Yuna explained.

"Come one Cloud, what's the worst of it?" Shuyin asked.

"I can live through evenings, but what about the weekend, two whole days of solitary confinement, I'LL …" he was silenced by Aeris with a deep and passionate kiss.

"I'll keep it to myself for once; hell the guy needs a good kiss!" exclaimed Irvine.

The rest of the day went by relatively quickly, too quickly for Cloud, during lunch he apologised to Aeris for not picking her up, and he explained why he left Sunstroke at home.

"Oh, I just remembered, what happened with your parents?" Cloud asked Wakka and Lulu.

"Well, my parents aren't too happy, but so long as we don't get an abortion or break up over it then they're fine," Wakka explained.

"My parents were furious, but when Wakka showed up and asked me to marry him when we finished high school, they simmered right down, my mother was over the moon when I said I would," Lulu explained with a smile, showing off the promise ring.

"So what about school, since you mentioned it?" Selphie asked.

"I'm going to keep going, ignore anything that anybody says about me being pregnant and when I go into labour then … we're still thinking about that one," Lulu answered.

After they broke up for lunch the rest of the day started flying by again, it only started to slow down for history.

Now if Cloud had brought Sunstroke that morning he would've noticed that other chocobo again, but he didn't, so he was slightly shocked to see that brunette woman again, this time in black office trousers and a pink blouse.

"Good afternoon," she said softly, Cloud greeted her and took his normal seat "if you don't mind I'd like to arrange where people sit, I've got reports from the principle here and I want to arrange a seating plan based on them," she explained.

'_Oh great, another class where I'm separated from Aeris,_' Cloud thought sourly.

It was quite entertaining when Seymour walked in, took one look at the new teacher and shouted "MOTHER! What are you doing here?" in total shock.

"Just stand against the wall Seymour and be quiet," she said, causing the other members of The Brotherhood to snigger.

Once everyone arrived she addressed them all.

"Now, for the most part I've heard good things about this class, though unfortunately there are a few troublemakers," she shot a look to The Brotherhood "so I've drawn up a seating plan to make sure that the troublemakers are at the front of the class, without making life difficult for those of you with short sight."

She then spent the next fifteen minutes taking the register and directing people to where she wanted them to sit as she said their names, the entire Brotherhood was on the front row with most of the Crusaders at the back, thankfully Aeris was still sat next to Cloud, the new teacher had tried having Cloud on the left and Aeris on the right, but when they bumped elbows she swapped them back.

"Now, I would like to formally introduce myself, my name is Mrs Guado and as you may have guessed I am Seymour's mother, I also have an assistant in my classes," as she said this a red wolf/dog, it was hard to tell, with a black mane and a flame on its tail and feathers stuck in his fur behind his ears, walked into the class, like the principle, he only had one good eye, his left.

The wolf walked to the back of the class and laid down, resting his head on his front paws and Mrs Guado started her lesson, acting as if the dog wasn't there.

So everybody started to take notes and after a while the dog started walking around, setting his front paws on the desk and looking at different people's work, some ignored him, others stopped working, afraid he'd attack.

When he got around to checking Cloud's work, he released Aeris' hand and gave him a friendly scratch behind the ears "So what's you name?" he asked the dog quietly.

"Nanaki," he whispered simply, causing Aeris to gasp and Cloud to recoil in shock "sorry, I did not intend to startle you," he apologised and left to continue examining people's work, mainly to ensure that they were paying attention, obviously, but possibly to see if they understood what was being said and if students were able to keep up.

When Nanaki got around to checking Aeris' work, the lesson was nearly over and they were working on a few questions, she too gave him a scratch behind the ears and he took a moment to enjoy the scratch, lolling his tongue out to the side.

"Thank you, that's been bothering me all day," he said quietly, she did scratch the opposite ear from what Cloud had.

"Why not ask for help?" Aeris asked.

"It would be rude, and you're meant to be working, not pampering me." Nanaki answered.

Without looking up Cloud suggested "Why not scratch it yourself?"

"I may look like a wolf, but it doesn't mean I have to act like one," he snapped quietly.

"Sorry, I meant no offence, it's just that if I have an itch, I deal with it, nothing wrong with doing so is there?" Cloud said defensively.

"Do you scratch with your foot?" Nanaki asked with a slight smirk.

"Well … er, no," Cloud mumbled and Aeris giggled.

"Nanaki, why are you distracting my students?" Mrs Guado asked, she'd appeared out of nowhere; then she noticed that Cloud had finished the task and that Aeris needed to round off a sentence and she'd be finished too.

"Forgive me, they're curious about me." Nanaki said, getting off the desk and looking ashamed.

Aeris quickly finished her work and tried to look guilty about distracting Nanaki from his job, Mrs Guado let them all off, and the young couple started to doodle on a shared piece of paper.

The lesson soon ended and the crusaders were happy to find that they didn't have any homework.

After everyone else left Aeris attempted to apologise to Nanaki for getting him into trouble, he just shrugged it off and started to follow Mrs Guado outside, once there they parted ways.

"Where do you live Nanaki?" Lulu asked.

"Anywhere and nowhere," he answered, The Crusaders weren't too happy about that and offered a place at their houses.

He declined at first, saying that it would be rude to just turn up randomly and expect someone to put him up, but eventually he agreed to use the tent in Cloud's backyard.

So Cloud, Seph, Aeris, Tifa and Nanaki were walking together, they parted ways at the usual spot and headed home, Cloud felt a little down with not being able to see Aeris much that day, but quickly got over it.

That evening he spent more time with his brother and helping Nanaki to settle in, Tiler and Jen welcomed him with open arms, and whilst Jen was cooking dinner he left to hunt.

Just as Jen was about to serve up the wolf walked into the kitchen from the back garden, he padded to the sink and, with a fair amount of effort, turn on the hot tap and started washing blood off his maw.

"Are you alright?" Jen asked, worried that he'd been injured.

"Yes, the only problem with hunting is being unable to do so without getting my prey's blood all over my mouth," he answered, his voice distorted by the water.

Jen gave him a motherly helping hand, with wasn't easy given that Nanaki's fur was the colour of blood already, but eventually he was cleaned off and everyone sat down for dinner.

"So Cloud how was your day?" Tiler asked.

"Could've been better, I'm becoming convinced that there's a conspiracy amongst the teachers to separate grounded students from their girlfriends, or boyfriends depending on their gender," he answered.

Seph laughed, having noticed the same thing, but Jen looked down shamefaced, thinking that maybe she shouldn't have been so hard on him.

"So I take it that you didn't spend much time with Aeris today, except at lunch," Tiler asked, glancing meaningfully at his wife.

"Not really, I got to sit next to her in one class, we were separated in sports and the rest of the day's a blur, but at least Wakka and Lulu had some good news," Cloud explained.

"Oh yeah, they're getting married as soon as they finish high school," Seph added.

"Any particular reason?" Jen asked, thinking that they'd be a little young.

"Lulu's pregnant, one week along I think Yuna's Dad said," Cloud explained, causing his parent's eyes to widen in shock.

After he'd finished his food, Cloud was lost for what to do for the rest of the night.

"So how about you go and see if Aeris is online Cloud?" Jen asked, he just stared at her, wondering if she was joking or trying to catch him out with breaking his punishment, but when she smiled kindly he knew she was trying to be nice. So he bolted for his room, Tiler had never seen him move so fast.

In his room Cloud found that Aeris wasn't online, but Lulu and Tifa were.

Tifa's 7th Heaven: Hi Cloud, you still grounded?

Gothic Witch has joined the conversation.

Cloud9Buster Sword: Hey Tifa, yeah I am, but I've been allowed to talk to people, now I know there IS an outside world

Gothic Witch: ROFL, I take it you wanted to talk to Aeris

Cloud9Buster Sword: *nods*

Tifa's 7th Heaven: Hey Cloud, I'm stopping at Tifa's tonight since we've got that Alchemy project to do

One Winged Angel has signed in.

One Winged Angel has joined the conversation.

Cloud9Buster Sword: Hey Aeris, what project??? I don't remember much of today

One Winged Angel: No worries Cloud, you're working with me and I'll TRY to explain it to you, besides, we've got a week on it and Cid can remind you tomorrow

Cloud9Buster Sword: That reminds me, how come Rikku didn't come over tonight?

One Winged Angel: She's protesting against your being grounded, thinking that by staying at school Mom'll let up just to get her to come back

Tifa's 7th Heaven: You're not having ME over there either, that way you've got an incentive to beg your mother to let Aeris come over *smirks* … that and you'll never get me in a janitor's closet either

One Winged Angel: HELL NO YOU ARE NOT USING SEX AGAINST ME!!!!!

Gothic Witch: I don't know about you Cloud but this is becoming quite entertaining

Cloud9Buster Sword: Agreed, don't mind us guys

Little Pink Flower Girl has signed in.

Little Pink Flower Girl: Thank heaven that Tifa's got a spare computer here, but it's slow and won't keep up with everyone talking

Cloud closed the other conversation and focused on his girlfriend.

**Seph's Room**

Little Pink Flower Girl has signed in.

Cloud9Buster Sword has left the conversation.

Gothic Witch: Well I saw that coming a mile away

One Winged Angel: Come on Tifa, don't do this to me *cries*

Tifa's 7th Heaven: You know my terms, and if you can't meet them then I'm sure you can live without getting into my pants for a week

This continued for the next two minutes until Seph signed off and went to find his mother.

As he passed Cloud's room he heard Cloud typing away furiously, obviously he and Aeris were having a long conversation, little did he know that, if someone was recording what they typed, they'd have a small porn scene script.

He soon found his mother and fell to his knees.

"Ok, what's going on?" she asked suspiciously.

"I'm desperate Mother, Tifa's refusing to come over here unless Aeris is allowed and on top of that she won't let me have my way with her either!" he cried out in one breath, Tiler started shaking with mirth as Jen tried to understand what her son was telling her.

Once she'd put the pieces together she smirked "Well, it might be better for you to suffer with Cloud since he's taken his example from you," she said in a sly voice, Tiler was starting to cough to cover his laughter.

"PLEASE I'M BEGGING YOU!!!" Seph was actually starting to cry at the thought of not getting laid for the rest of the week.

"What's it worth to me?" she asked.

"I'll love you for all eternity and I'll never complain about you and Dad having your innuendos and I'll do the dishes for a whole month!" he half shouted in desperation.

She pretended to think on it for a few minutes, during which Seph started to lose hope "How much of the dishes, just the washing or the whole thing?" she wanted to make him think she hadn't been won over.

"Whole thing, WHOLE THING!!!!" he shouted without even thinking.

"Ok then, they can come over tomorrow night but they're not allowed to stop over, okay?" she said with a smirk, knowing that he'd kick himself once he'd realised what he'd done.

"YIPPIE!" he yelled in a high pitched voice while jumping in the air and clicking his heels before running up to his computer to tell the girls.

Tifa's 7th Heaven: So how much effort did it take?

Seph told her, thought about what was now on the screen after hitting the enter then added to it 'AWE CRAP!!!!' before informing Cloud that he owed him big time.

**That's all for now, I'll be updating as soon as I possibly can.**


End file.
